Church Of St Mary

Church of St. Mary

This is an Anglican parish church at Purton, built over three centuries from the 13th to the 15th century and comprehensively restored in 1872 by the architect W. Butterfield. The building is constructed of coursed rubble limestone with stone slate and lead roofs.

The church comprises a nave and aisles, transepts and crossing with a steeple, a chancel, south porch, and a west tower. Most of the exterior windows date from the 15th century in the Perpendicular style, with three and four-light designs. The south chapel has an exceptional curvilinear east window, while the north aisle west window displays reticulated tracery. The south porch features angle buttresses, a double chamfered door, and a transverse arch.

The chancel windows are two-light openings set in deep casement moulded reveals. The east end was rebuilt in 1872. At the centre stands a tower from around 1325, featuring two-light bell openings, a crenellated parapet, and a simple octagonal spire with angle rolls. The 15th-century west tower, built on a different alignment, rises through three stages with three-light bell openings screened by perforated stone. It displays a west window and door flanked by three canopied niches and single niches on the north and south sides, now containing 20th-century statuary. Angle buttresses incorporate a sundial, and a north stair turret rises toward crocketed corner pinnacles. This unusual arrangement of both a central spire and a west tower appears only at two other known locations: Wanborough and Ormskirk.

The interior presents a three-bay nave with 13th-century round columns and capitals. The south respond may be 12th-century, while the north side displays stiff-leaf capitals. The columns were heightened to carry later 14th-century arches. The roof is an open arch braced collar trussed rafter type with collar purlin. A tall west tower arch on three shafts dates from the later 14th or 15th century. The crossing is 14th-century with reserved chamfered arches without capitals, beneath an octopartite vault. Both transepts feature open trussed rafter roofs with arches to east chapels. A piscina survives in the south transept.

The chancel is 13th-century with a single blocked window on the north side. Steps lead to the east end, where a timber barrel vault and sedilia are present, along with a triple piscina. The north wall contains an Easter sepulchre. The chancel also features fine, very elaborate crocketed canopied niches on the east wall with angel corbels; this decorative work is probably 14th-century but was reworked in the 19th century. The south chancel chapel is a single bay with a pitched roof. The south aisle has its own independently pitched open trussed rafter roof with archbraces and collars. The north aisle has a low pitched roof on chamfered ties and purlins. The north chancel chapel now serves as the organ chamber and opens to the transept via a low arch. A chamber above the south porch contains a fireplace and angle stair.

The interior fittings include a simple octagonal limestone font at the west end of the nave. The pulpit is open 19th-century oak work in Gothic style with a tester and carved tracery on the soffit. The nave arcade is painted with blue and yellow mouldings, with painted red coffering on the soffit intrados. The capital backgrounds to the stiff-leaf work are coloured blue. The south aisle displays a freely interpreted Judgement scene painted over the transept arch. A figure displaying stigmata appears over the south door with a waterwheel depicted in the background. Two further scenes occupy the south transept. The south chapel contains a restored Death of the Virgin.

Much fragmented glass from the 14th to 16th centuries has been assembled in the south transept south window and in the head of the north side west window. Two 13th- to 14th-century heads, probably reset, appear on the jambs of the arch to the north chancel chapel. A small damaged Annunciation scene sits on a crossing pier. The north aisle preserves a recessed 14th-century niche, as does the south porch; both now contain 20th-century figures.

The church displays an extensive collection of monuments and tablets spanning from the 17th century onwards. In the north aisle, a wall tablet of the 18th century commemorates Samuel Sheppard, who died in 1782, rendered in stone slab on veined marble with pediment and bracketed shelf. A circular white marble tablet on black records Matthew Bivash, died 1839. A further tablet with fluted pilasters commemorates John Sadler and family. Additional 19th- and 20th-century tablets and brasses occupy the west wall.

The south aisle contains an 18th-century tablet of white stone on veined marble with broken double pediment to Anthony Bathe and family, died 1769. An oval white on black marble tablet depicts a draped urn over a waisted shield for William Large, died 1810. A limestone tablet from 1725 honours George Stephens and family, died 1712, with the inscription set in a pilastered aedicule beneath a broken segmental pediment and painted dado.

The south transept holds a 17th-century monument of black and white marbles commemorating Nevill Maskelyne, died 1679, with a garlanded oval inscription and cherubs supporting arms devolving into acanthus. A chaste tablet in grey and white marble records Nevil Maskelyne, the Astronomer Royal, died 1811, with a Latin inscription. An alabaster 19th-century monument to Anthony Maskelyne, a barrister died 1879, features a gilded inscription with eared architrave, fruit trails at the sides, a pulvinus and pediment with a painted crest and obelisks.

In the chancel, a wall tablet from 1845 in black and white marbles was executed by Franklin of Purton. An 18th-century white marble monument to Catherine Ashley and family, died 1726, displays a pedimented panel with moulded base and crest above.

The south chapel contains an 18th-century monument of veined marble with black detail to Thomas Richmond, and another 18th-century marble monument with an open pediment to Toby and Ann, died 1736 and 1718 respectively. An 18th-century oval tablet by Franklin in white marble on black commemorates John Bryant, died 1793, with a draped urn over a shield.

The north transept holds two 18th-century tablets in white marble on black: an oval panel with wreath and another with square panel, pediment, and apron.

Beneath the west tower stand charity boards dated 1778 (for Hissocks Leaze) and 1896 (for churchyard extension), with three further large boards in the ringing chamber. A former reredos triptych is also stored here.

A Flemish painting of the Last Supper hangs over the altar, and an Adoration appears on the north wall.