Church Of St Michael

The Church of St Michael is a parish church with origins in the late 12th century. It incorporates elements from the 13th, 14th, and 15th centuries, and was restored in 1902. The church is largely constructed of coursed rubble stone, with the remainder roughcast and featuring stone quoins and a plinth. It has slate roofs, and concrete parapets, moulded to the chancel and battlemented elsewhere.

The west tower, originally 14th century, was rebuilt in 1891, featuring two stages with angle buttresses, a stair turret, carved gargoyles, two-light cusped openings to the bell-chamber, a west door, and a traceried window. A 19th-century vestry is attached to the north side, alongside a six-bay late 15th-century clerestory of two-light cusped windows with flat heads. The north aisle has several windows with two-centred heads and Y tracery, including a small, moulded doorway. The south aisle also has irregularly placed late 15th and 16th-century cusped windows, and its south doorway has a moulded arch, an outer band of chevron on attached piers with carved capitals, and a moulded niche above. A south porch, also rebuilt, features a moulded arch and rainwater heads dated 1736. The chancel has a bay of two-light traceried windows, a bay of 15th-century three-light windows with flat heads, and cusped lancets on both north and south walls, with a small moulded doorway on the south. The east window is a much-restored three-light traceried design.

Inside, a moulded arch leads to the tower. The nave has a 14th-century north arcade with six bays of moulded arches on octagonal piers. A similar arrangement exists towards the east end of the south arcade, while the remainder of the south arcade is from the 12th and early 13th centuries, featuring two-centred arches of two off-set orders, one with a roll moulding, on circular piers with scalloped capitals. Labels have nailhead, dogtooth, or ball ornament and rest on carved head stops or short attached colonettes. The nave roof is a 19th-century addition, supported by 15th-century carved stone corbels. A cusped piscina is found in the north aisle, while the south aisle has a piscina with a four-centred head. A moulded chancel arch stands on semi-octagonal piers, with an outer order on slender attached shafts.

The church contains a 15th-century octagonal font with traceried panels, an elaborate 19th-century marble pulpit originally from Blenheim, and other 19th-century fittings. Notable monuments include a stone effigy of a knight from around 1330, memorial tablets to Guy Carleton and Christian Wake (1608 and 1609 respectively), a 18th-century marble tablet to John Ellis and his wife, and an oval inscription tablet to Henry Wilkinson (died 1647). Brasses depict Robert Piggott and his wife (mid-16th century), Hugh Bristowe (1548), Richard Huntyndon (1543), and Sir Roger Dynham (1490), with a large figure and triple canopy.