Church Of St Mary The Virgin

Church of St Mary the Virgin, Bishops Cannings

This is an Anglican parish church built on the site of a former episcopal estate. The building dates from the early 13th century through to the 15th century, with substantial restoration work undertaken in 1862–63 and again in 1883.

The church is constructed in ashlar limestone with a cruciform plan. It comprises a short nave with aisles and a south porch, transepts with an east lady chapel attached to the south transept, and a two-storey vestry (partly of flint) on the north side of the chancel. A central tower with spire rises over the crossing. The roof is lead-covered on the nave and aisles, stone-tiled on the transepts, chancel and south porch, and slate-covered on the south chapel.

The exterior shows work of different periods. The nave and aisles have three-light windows with Perpendicular tracery, but the west end retains triple lancets. Large clerestory windows run along the nave, with a crenellated parapet and pinnacles that conceal the higher pitched roof of the former 13th-century nave. The south porch features a cusped traceried outer arch (now damaged) and ballflowers on tendrils. Above this is a gabled string with large leaf crockets and flanking panelled buttresses, representing a 15th-century encasement of the original late 13th-century porch. The transepts have gabled buttresses, corbel tables and lancet windows; the Lady Chapel is similar but was refaced in the 19th century. The chancel, dating to around 1250, has offsetting buttresses and a plain parapet. Its south side has 'Y' traceried windows replacing the multiple moulded lancets that remain on the north. The east end was reworked in the 19th century. External features include stoups by the north aisle and north transept doors, mass dials on the porch (which also has remains of a stoup), and a sundial with gnomon on the gable of the south transept.

The tower has nook shafts at its angles rising to a corbel table, two blind lancets at ringing level, and three tall lancets to the bell stage, all fitted with pierced stone screens. A stair tower at the north-east angle rises high above the roof with a conical capping. The tower itself has a plain parapet and a simple octagonal spire.

The porch is vaulted with an undercut foliage boss at the intersection and cylindrical corbels. The inner doorcase has nook shafts with scrolled capitals carrying an early 13th-century round arch with a corbel at its apex.

The interior reveals the church's long building history. The nave dates from the early 13th century and features arcades of four bays with pointed arches of two orders supported on round columns with trumpet scalloped capitals. The unplastered walls above show the positions of four clerestory windows on each side; the eastern sills were raised when a rood screen access was inserted. The western lancets have stiff-leaf foliage to their internal shafts. The roof comprises five king-post trusses dated "TW 1670 WS", with wall posts resting on large stone corbels carved in the forms of heads of kings and bishops.

The north aisle contains two western lancets (the lower from the late 12th or early 13th century, the upper with an adjacent aumbry serving a former floored area under the early steep roof). A blocked stair in the north aisle once led to a bridge across the aisle to the rood screen. The aisle roofs were replaced when the walls were heightened.

The crossing was inserted later into the early 13th-century work and consists of heavy octagonal piers carrying a lierne vault that represents a 15th-century reworking of an earlier crossing. The vault features carved bosses at the intersections and a central circular bell-lift.

The south transept displays two heavily moulded arches on its east side with stiff-leaf capitals and shafts; the wall was rebuilt further out. A trefoiled early-to-mid 13th-century piscina with credence shelf survives here. A 15th-century wall painting of ashlar appears in the reveal of the west windows. The eastern chapel, dedicated to Our Lady of the Bower and also dating to the 13th century, was converted to the Ernle chapel in 1563 and now has a 19th-century iron screen.

The chancel is a late 13th-century structure of three bays with quadripartite ribbed vaulting on round attached columns and capitals, and carved bosses at the intersections of double-shafted ribs. A blocked south priest door is present. Late 13th to early 14th-century sedilia (partly obscuring an earlier piscina with a blocked low window to the exterior) were inserted at a later stage. A mid-13th-century piscina with a bowl supported on twin columns stands at the east end. The north transept, now used as a choir vestry, also has stilted eastern arches with stiff-leaf capitals and a blocked north door. The sacristy is two storeys, with the ground floor dating to the 13th century and the upper floor a late medieval alteration.

The furnishings and fittings include a late 15th-century font: octagonal with quatrefoiled panels on a short octagonal column, raised over two steps. A 19th-century pulpit of openwork oak stands on a corbelled stone base with a brass and iron handrail featuring a crozier terminal. A 19th-century oak eagle lectern is also present. The chancel altar dates to around 1830 and is constructed of limestone, panelled with a cinquefoiled panelled stone reredos. An organ of 1809 by George Pike England (given by Captain Cook's navigator William Bailey) retains its Gothick case, refurbished in 1884, though some original pipework survives. Pews of 1883 by Hems of Exeter feature carved bench ends.

Additional furniture includes a 17th-century crossing altar with a carved top and stretchers, a 17th-century offertory box with a heavy turned column, octagonal head and three locks as required by Canon Law, and an early 17th-century free-standing carrel with a moulded seat and desk. A high side panel with top moulding (probably 15th-century) bears a joyless painting of early 17th-century date depicting the hand of meditation. In the Lady Chapel are a 16th-century table with baluster legs and stretchers, and a 17th- to early 18th-century houselling bench.

The monuments are numerous and span several centuries. In the chancel south wall is a white marble tablet on slate to Thomas Brown of Horton (died 1822) and later family. The north wall carries four 19th-century white marble tablets on slate: a gabled panel to Frances Macdonald (died 1838) by Osmund of Sarum; a sarcophagus with draped urn to Elizabeth Ruddle Gibbs (died 1816); a draped urn over a corniced panel to Thomas Skeate (died 1831) and his wife; and a simple panel to George Ruddle (died 1801) and his wife by Holbrook of Bath. A limestone monument with a shouldered panel, pediment, gadrooned base and fluted apron commemorates Rev. John Shergold (died 1777).

In the Ernle Chapel stands a wall tomb of 1571 in limestone, consisting of a chest of three panels with shields on strapwork and flanking pilasters that frame a central arched recess. An entablature and cresting with arms and a mantled helm against a scrolled gable crowns the composition. An inscribed panel on a strapwork cartouche within the recess records John Ernle of Bourton, who died "a thousand, five hundred threescore and a leven" (1571). On the east wall is a floor-based wall monument of Purbeck marble panel in a white marble frame with Purbeck columns, a steep broken pediment with central coloured arms on a mantled field, and flaming lamps on the gable ends. This commemorates Edward Ernle of Ichilhampton (died 1656) and his grandson Edward. A good floor slab also marks the burial of Martha Ernle (1716).

Brasses are numerous: eleven 19th-century examples in the chancel (dating from 1862 to 1922), two Barrow Mogg brasses in the nave, and a copper repousée Art Nouveau memorial to the Boer War on an oak shield in the south aisle.

External monuments include a limestone panel of 1792 on the south porch with a crest, apron and illegible inscription between pilasters; a shaped limestone panel of the 18th century on the south transept with scrollwork around a weathered inscription; and two monuments on the chancel: an aedicule of 1735 with fluted pilasters and broken pediment to Sarah Gambler of Devizes, and a panel of 1734 with heavy foliage to Mary Sloper.

The east window is of 13th-century design by Wailes with pale figures, and pale figures also appear in the south chancel windows. Medieval graffiti survives on the south-west tower pier.