Church Of St Mary

The Church of St Mary is a parish church largely of the mid-13th century, with a chancel and central tower. The nave was altered in the 14th and 15th centuries. A south aisle was added in the mid-15th century and a north aisle in the late 15th century, both extended eastwards past the tower to form chapels. A south porch was added in 1865-7, when the entire church underwent extensive restoration. The church is constructed of greensand rubble with limestone dressings; the tower is rendered. The nave and chancel have slate roofs, while the aisles and tower have lead roofs and battlemented parapets. The west end features a three-light traceried window above a small moulded doorway with a two-centred arch. There are also three-light aisle windows with cusped lights and four-centred heads. The south aisle has similar windows, three to the south and one to the east, and a two-light window with a flat head to the left of the door. The doorway has a moulded two-centred arch with blind tracery within the spandrels and carved angel stops to the flat hoodmould. The north aisle has three three-light windows with flat heads and a moulded doorway. The central tower has a bell-chamber with two-light decorated windows, and an octagonal stair turret on the south side. The early English chancel is characterised by a bay of lancet windows to the north and south, and a three-light window with plate tracery to the east. Inside the nave, there are four bays of 15th-century double chamfered arches on octagonal piers with moulded capitals, and a 13th-century triple chamfered arch on more massive semi-octagonal piers to the tower. A similar arch connects the tower to the chancel. The tower has solid walls to the north and south, with the south wall displaying a blocked two-light window, a restored arched doorway, and a single light to the stair turret in the southeast corner, alongside a moulded archway leading to the chapel, now a vestry. The north chapel features a double chamfered arch to the chancel and an original arched piscina. The chancel retains good 13th-century details, with the windows deeply recessed and displaying traces of paintings on the splays, having moulded arches on slender ringed shafts with moulded capitals; the shafts of the east window are of coloured marble. Fittings include a 17th-century altar table with turned baluster legs, late 19th-century glass, and other 19th-century fittings. There are 18th and 19th-century marble memorial tablets to members of the Duncombe and Barton families, including one dated 1721, one to Rev. John Barton (1760), one to Mary Bristowe (1762), and one to Rev. Philip Barton (1786). A handsome pair of early to mid-18th-century tablets flank the south door, featuring curved black marble inscription panels, flanking Ionic columns, entablatures with mourning putti and coats of arms, and gilded cherub heads and skulls to the bases.