Church Of All Saints

The Church of All Saints is an Anglican parish church with origins in the early 12th century. It was enlarged around 1200, with further additions in the mid-14th century and late 15th century. The church underwent repairs in the early to mid-18th century and was restored in the late 19th century by Waller.

Exterior Construction and Materials

The nave's north wall features ashlar stonework in its lower half, with random limestone rubble above. The south wall is pebble-dashed but retains exposed ashlar quoins. The chancel is built of random limestone rubble with ashlar quoins. Both the south chapel and north transept are constructed entirely of ashlar. The tower's lower two stages use random roughly squared and dressed limestone with dressed stone quoins, while the upper stage features coursed squared and dressed limestone. The porch is limestone rubble with dressed stone quoins. The nave has a shallow pitched leaded roof, whilst other roofs are stone slate, with a single ashlar chimney stack.

Plan and Layout

The church consists of a nave with north and south chapels positioned at right angles to it, a vestry on the west side of the north chapel, a chancel, and a west tower. The 12th-century nave was largely rebuilt following a fire in 1465–1470.

South Wall and Entrance

The nave's south wall stands on a high flat-chamfered plinth. It contains a tall 18th-century three-light window with round-headed lights and carved spandrels. An early 20th-century plank door, reached by twelve stone steps within a Tudor-arched surround, provides access to an 18th-century gallery inside the church.

The main entrance features a 15th-century studded plank door with fillets, strap hinges, blind tracery, an early lock, and closing ring attachments, all set within the porch. The doorway itself retains its 12th-century surround with jamb shafts topped by scalloped capitals supporting a roll-moulded arch with imposts and a recessed tympanum decorated with diaper work. The outer margin has chevron decoration. The diapered decoration on the lintel includes four small human heads. To the right of the porch is another three-light window matching the one on the left.

Lady Chapel

The late 15th-century Lady Chapel has a flat-chamfered plinth. Its south window is a pointed four-light Perpendicular window with a stopped hood. Below on the left is a projecting base, possibly for a stoup or small statue. On the lower right is a probably 16th-century incised outline of a Manticore (a beast with a man's head and a lion's hind quarters). Above the window is a square stone sundial. The east window is a three-light window with a rectangular surround and mullions featuring stepped mouldings.

North Wall and Chapel

The nave's north wall has a moulded plinth and three buttresses with offsets. It contains a single pointed three-light Perpendicular window with a stopped hood, and a double studded door with a moulded surround and stopped hood.

A 15th-century battlemented parapet runs along both sides and the east end of the nave. Below the parapet is a string course with fine gargoyles, including two muzzled bears. Crocketed finials stand at the south-east and north-east corners.

The late 15th-century north chapel has a moulded plinth and diagonal buttresses, with a three-light Perpendicular north window featuring a stopped hood. A 19th-century lean-to vestry attached to it contains a rectangular three-light north window with quatrefoils at the top.

Tower

The three-stage tower has 12th-century lower stages with clasping buttresses (the south-west buttress, containing a newel stair, was added in the 15th century). The upper stage is Transitional in style. The first floor stage on the north and south walls retains single narrow 12th-century windows—one with a round head and relieving arch, the other with a flat-chamfered segmental head and rebated surround.

The ground floor stage on the west wall has a probably 16th-century two-light window with hollow-moulded four-centred arched heads to each light, carved spandrels, and a hood with crudely carved stops. Above this is a single lancet. A reused corbel head appears between the two stages. An incised leopard on the west face of the stair projection is in the same style as, and probably contemporary with, the Manticore on the south chapel.

The Transitional belfry stage features tall paired lancets with stone slate louvres and engaged jamb shafts. A single central shaft rises to a lintel with carved head corbels and moulded corbels on the east and west. The upper parts of the windows on the north and south sides were removed in the late 15th century due to fire damage. A flat-chamfered string runs below the belfry windows.

Porch

The projecting gabled 14th-century porch has hanging slate on the gable and double doors with open timberwork. A monument to William Croome (died 1886) is on the right-hand return wall. The porch has a 14th-century wagon roof (formerly plastered), a stone flag floor with stone bench seats, one large early grave slab, and two smaller fragments of grave slabs on the seats.

Roof Details

Stepped coping runs along the chancel, tower, and north and south chapels. Upright cross finials, roll cross saddles, and lead guttering and downpipes are dated variously 1936, 1940, and 1959. The guttering over the William Croome monument is decorated with vine scroll and dated and initialled 'W.I.C. 1940'.

Interior

The plastered interior features a five-bay nave with a 15th-century coffered oak ceiling. This has moulded and cambered tie beams, each with a short king post and two short struts. Wall posts with pierced brackets rest on fine large 15th-century carved head corbels. Carved and painted bosses appear at the panel intersections of the easternmost bay. The south chapel has a coffered wagon roof (possibly 15th century), whilst the north chapel has an early 20th-century coffered wagon roof; both have carved bosses at the panel intersections. The chancel has a plastered barrel vault.

The restored round-headed chancel arch dates to around 1180–90 and features two engaged keel-moulded piers with Transitional capitals on either side. A large keel moulding continues over the entire archway. Above the chancel arch (above the rood position) is a now-blocked three-light stone-mullioned window with Tudor-headed lights.

Tall almost identical four-centred archways with engaged piers and casement-moulded surrounds lead to the north and south chapels. A lower matching arch opened to the left of the entrance to the south chapel in 1880, giving access to a small organ chamber with sacristy below. A squint runs from the north chapel to the chancel. A passage squint and flat-chamfered Tudor-arched doorway provide access to stairs to the rood loft from the south transept. A 19th-century piscina is in the south-east corner of the south chapel.

The rood loft (1925) and screen to the south chapel (1914) are in 15th-century style by F.C. Eden. A 16th-century Italian figure of Christ is mounted on the rood screen. A 20th-century panelled screen with Jacobean-style overthrow stands between the nave and chancel.

A gallery built in 1754 at the west end of the nave features fielded panelling with painted marbling.

Fixtures and Fittings

The church contains a late 15th-century octagonal font inside the north door. A stone chalice-shaped pulpit dating to around 1480 stands to the left of the chancel arch. Cut from a single block of stone, it features blind tracery and crocketing. The three bands of lily pattern suggest it may be the work of Burford masons.

A restored wooden reading desk with carved panels—one initialled and dated 'W.C. 1631', three with carved heads—stands to the right of the chancel arch. A Flemish brass eagle lectern from around 1450 sits on a 15th-century Spanish steel stand. Within the north chapel is a wooden altar table with turned legs, first used in the chancel in 1634. The south chapel contains a 19th-century stone altar table with three 15th-century statues on the reredos.

The chancel sanctuary features turned oak communion rails made in 1734, a Medieval stone altar slab on a later stone base, a painted reredos by F.C. Eden from 1924, a 17th-century carved oak chair, and two early wooden chests—one with linenfold panelling, the other with sunflower decoration. A central early 18th-century chased brass chandelier hangs at the crossing.

Monuments

A 12th-century grave slab with a foliated cross, found in the nave, is now reused in the nave's north wall. Nearby are two early reused carved beast's head corbels, also reused from the upper stage of the tower. A 12th-century shaft (probably from a small belfry window) rests on the sill of the window to the right of these features.

Remains of a 14th-century rector's tomb with one crocketed pinnacle are in the north wall of the chancel. Two 19th-century grey and white marble monuments also appear in the chancel, one by Malard and Cooke of Gloucester.

The Lady Chapel walls display several monuments: an oval monument to Thomas Tyndale (died 1783) with a classical mourning figure in white marble by J.C.F. Rossi; a monument to Thomas Rich (died 1703/4) with cherubs and painted heraldry; and a Baroque tablet to Thomas Rich, Master in Chancery (died 1647). Various other 19th-century white and grey marble monuments are also present.

A fine classical-style monument commemorates Richard Painter and his wife Joyce (he died 1749, she died 1757). It features two fluted pilasters below an entablature with three flaming urns at the top, all decorated with painted marbling. An early 19th-century limestone monument to other members of the Painter family is on the east side of the north chapel.

Stained Glass

The late 15th-century east window of the Lady Chapel, by the Bristol School of Glass, depicts the Virgin standing between two bishops. The south window contains 19th-century heraldic glass.

The north chapel has two 15th-century stained glass windows. The north window, a memorial to Rector William Whitchurch (instituted 1464), depicts three figures with the Virgin and child at the centre. The east window shows the crucifixion flanked by single figures. A late 18th or early 19th-century figure of St. Nicholas is also present.