Church Of St John The Baptist

Church of St. John the Baptist

Anglican parish church, dating from around 1200 with significant 13th-century work, substantially rebuilt around 1450, and heavily restored in 1854 and again in 1877 by Wilson, Willcox and Wilson of Bath. The building is constructed of ashlar and rubble stone with stone tile and slate roofs topped with coped gables.

The church comprises a 12th-century nave with a later 13th-century clerestorey, a 13th-century chancel much altered in subsequent periods, a later 13th-century north-east chapel, and 15th-century aisles and porch, probably incorporating earlier work. The centrepiece is a fine ashlar west tower of 15th-century date, three stages in height with set-back buttresses and a north-east stair turret. The tower has a heavy moulded plinth and string courses. The lower stage contains a large 4-light window over a small arched door to the west front, with similar 4-light blank panels to the sides. The second stage displays 5 long cusped-head panels with a statue niche to each face. The top stage has paired cusped bell-openings continued as blank panels below a transom, with pierced stonework to the bell-openings. A moulded coved cornice and trefoil pierced parapet with corner pinnacles and a stone spirelet to the stair tower complete the tower. A one-handed clock appears on the west face.

The south aisle has a low roof with parapet, two flat-headed 2-light windows flanking a much-restored porch with sloping buttresses and a statue niche. To the right is a restored Perpendicular 4-light arched window with hood. The clerestorey was rebuilt in the 19th century with moulded eaves and three windows. The chancel has a slate roof and a rebuilt south wall with moulded eaves and two 19th-century flat-headed Perpendicular-style 3-light windows (outlines of original lancets were visible in 1855). An eastern 19th-century Decorated-style 3-light window lights the chancel's east end. The north chapel has a slate roof with its east end aligned with the chancel's east end, featuring a 3-light restored Decorated east window with sexfoil head, corbelled eaves to the north side, a 19th-century blocked door, and a restored 2-light window. A 1877 vestry in High Victorian Gothic style is attached, with a large truncated east-end stack over an octofoil light. The north aisle has a parapet, carved gargoyles, buttresses, and moulded plinth, with three renewed Perpendicular-style north windows of 3-light with pointed heads and a large 4-light Perpendicular-style west window.

The interior features a tierceron star vault with an octagon bell-rope opening to the tower. A screen forming part of the 15th-century chancel screen survives. The 4-bay nave has heavily restored circular piers with trumpet capitals and square abaci on the south side; the north side has two stiff-leaf capitals with octagonal abaci. The pointed arcade has one-step soffits to the earlier south side and double-chamfer moulding to the later north side, with the west arches being 15th-century. The roof is 19th-century collar-rafter with pierced spandrels to straight braces. The south aisle has a 19th-century south door and 19th-century roof. At the east end stands an effigy of R. Walmsley (died 1893) signed by H.H. Armstead. The north aisle contains fine carved corbel heads and has a 19th-century roof. An inset fragment of a 9th-century cross and a figure of a saint dating from around 1200 are preserved here. The second window contains glass of 1881, while the third retains fragments of medieval glass.

The chancel has been heavily restored. The east window, dating from around 1854, contains faded glass by Bell of Bristol. A stone reredos was added in 1905. On the south wall are 13th-century style sedilia and piscina (19th-century, though the piscina incorporates original material) and a 14th-century style ogee-arched tomb-recess. The north wall displays an elaborate 15th-century style triple sedilia, originally on the south wall next to the piscina but moved and almost entirely remade in 1877. The roof is 19th-century. Two heavily restored arches lead to the north-east chapel, similar to the nave's north arcade. The north-east chapel has a 19th-century roof and original carved heads to the east window, with a tomb recess of around 1300 in the north wall. Numerous wall plaques from the 17th to 19th centuries are collected in the north-east chapel. In the north aisle, a plaque to E. Teyly dated 1627 features Ionic pilasters.