Church Of St Nicholas

The Church of St Nicholas is an Anglican parish church largely dating to the late 12th century, with a 15th-century remodelling and a heavy restoration in 1888 by Mark Hookham of Stow-on-the-Wold. The church is constructed of rubble with a Cotswold stone roof. It comprises a small three-bay nave and chancel, with a gabled south porch of 1888 and a north vestry. The west gable end has an ashlar bellcote of 1888, featuring three enriched strings with chevron (below), pellet (centre), and double cable (upper) decoration, a central wall buttress below a central lancet window. The south wall, potentially rebuilt in the 15th century, retains a 12th-century eaves string and a three-light square-headed window with rectilinear tracery. The south door is richly ornamented with two orders of nook-shafts; the inner ones are twisted on chevron bases with scallop caps, and the label features saltire crosses. The tympanum has a diaper of chip-carved crosses, similar to those at Aston Blank and Upper Slaughter, over a larger carved lintel within a surround of chevron on a roll-mould and hollow jambs. The chancel has buttresses and a dado string. To the south is a blocked central window and a two-light plate-tracery window without a label, with a smaller window below it. The east wall has two round-headed lancets, restored in 1888, and the north side has a string with plain chevron ornament. Inside, the chancel arch is pointed with a keeled roll-mould and a hollow external chevron order and label of saltire crosses, with nook-shafts reserved within chevron jambs and scallop caps; the archway on the chancel side is plainer. A 12th-century string runs through the chancel, along with a pointed piscina with a broken projecting lip on a crude-head corbel and chaumbries. A panelled reredos, possibly re-used from the 17th century, is present. A marble wall monument on the north side of the chancel commemorates John Payne (died 1813). The octagonal font, possibly 14th century but cut back from a circular bowl, sits on a heavy stem; Verey suggests it is 15th century.