Church Of St Mary

Church of St Mary, East Knoyle

An Anglican parish church on the north side of Church Road, dating from the 12th to 15th centuries with significant later alterations and restorations. The building is constructed of rubble stone and dressed limestone, with stone slate roof to the nave and a tiled chancel roof.

The church comprises a west tower, nave, chancel, north and south aisles, a south organ chamber, and a south porch. The south porch is gabled with a diagonal buttress and a 14th-century double chamfered pointed opening with compound pilasters. The nave features a 19th-century three-light Perpendicular-style window to the left and two 2-light square-headed 15th-century windows to the clerestory. The double gabled aisle has a west half added in 1845 and contains two 19th-century plate tracery windows with coped verges. The organ chamber, added in 1876, has 2-light plate tracery windows and a Burbridge wall tablet with broken pediment on its east wall.

The 12th-century chancel retains two 13th-century lancets on the north and south walls. The north wall also displays a blocked doorway and traces of 12th-century round-arched blind arcading, alongside a 15th-century five-light Perpendicular east window. The north aisle, double gabled with a west half added in 1829, contains a pair of 14th-century cusped lancets and an unidentified oval wall tablet on the east wall, with two 2-light cusped pointed windows to the north and a 19th-century ashlar stack and trefoil to the west. A lean-to vestry has square-headed windows. A 15th-century square-headed clerestory window is also present.

The large 15th-century three-stage tower features a moulded plinth, diagonal buttresses, and a wide 15th-century moulded west doorway with lozenge terminals to the hoodmould. Above this is a tall 3-light Perpendicular window. The bellstage is divided into two floors on the west with two 2-light square-headed windows and one square-headed window to the other sides. The south side has two crocketed image niches. An integral polygonal stair turret stands at the south-east corner. The tower is surmounted by a string course with gargoyles and a battlemented parapet.

Internally, the porch contains a doorway to the aisle and a moulded Tudor-arched door to the nave. The nave has a five-bay 19th-century king-post roof with braced collars. The tower features a stone fan-vaulted ceiling with cusps and a bell hatch, with a pointed tower arch filled by a 19th-century screen. The north and south aisles have two-bay arcades of continuously chamfered arches with collar rafter roofs. The chancel arch is Neo-Norman with a zig-zag moulded round arch. The chancel itself has a late 19th-century three-bay rib-panelled roof and contains a 2-seat sedilia and piscina with trefoil heads on the south wall and a Minton tiled reredos.

Of particular significance is the exceptional plasterwork by Robert Brockway commissioned by Dean Christopher Wren around 1639, depicting biblical scenes such as Jacob's Dream and the Ascension with texts in panels with strapwork decoration and strapwork friezes.

Fittings include a 17th-century altar table and a 17th-century polygonal pulpit reset on a 19th-century stone base, a 13th-century octagonal stone font with foliage carving, and an early 19th-century brass candelabra in the chancel. A stained glass east window depicts the Seymour family. Two benefaction boards are mounted on the north wall of the nave. Six bells, cast in 1726, 1748, 1794, and 1839, were rehung in 1933.

Monuments include a grey marble table in the chancel to Elizabeth Seymour (died 1742) with pediment and urn in a keyed oculus, various classical tablets to the Still family of Clouds (1701-1832), and 19th-century classical marble tablets in the nave to the Folliot family of Knoyle Down (by Osmond of Sarum) and the Burleton family of Wyken Hall, Leicestershire (by King of London).

The church underwent restoration in 1845 by Wyatt and Brandon, in 1876 by A.W. Blomfield, and the tower was restored in 1893 by P. Webb.

Dean Christopher Wren, father of Sir Christopher Wren, served as rector here from 1623 to 1646 and commissioned the chancel plasterwork. This plasterwork was later used as evidence against him at a trial at Longford Castle in 1647.