Church Of St John The Baptist

Church of St John the Baptist

A church of 14th and 15th-century date with origins in the 13th century, standing on the south side of Blisworth High Street. The building was restored in 1856 by E.F. Law, and the south aisle was rebuilt in 1926. It is constructed of coursed squared ironstone and limestone with slate and lead roofs.

The church comprises a chancel, nave, north and south aisles, a north porch, and a west tower. The three-bay chancel contains a five-light east window with unusual Decorated tracery, three-light Perpendicular windows to the north with four-centred heads, and small blocked low-side windows to the north-west and south-west with cusped heads and cut spandrels. Two two-light 13th-century windows survive to the south, the easternmost having a trefoil-in-circle head and the other with Y tracery; all have hood moulds. Another blocked low-side window to the south-west has a double-chamfered stone surround. The chancel has offset diagonal buttresses, offset buttresses between bays, and a plain stone-coped parapet.

The nave has a three-bay clerestory with two-light Perpendicular windows and hollow-chamfered stone eaves. A large single-light window at the south-west end, formerly traceried, is also present. The south aisle, which stops short of the south-west bay of the nave, features a large five-light window to the south-east under a gable with a straight head and a three-light window to the south with a four-centred head; both have hood moulds. The south door is moulded with a double-hollow-chamfered surround and hood mould.

The north aisle has a three-light east window with a straight head, wide single-light windows to the north-east and a two-light window to the south-west, all with four-centred heads, and a two-light window to the west with a chamfered stone mullion and straight head; all have hood moulds. A double hollow-chamfered and moulded north door is set within the porch, which bears a datestone inscribed "AD1607/WB CM" above a hollow-chamfered doorway. The porch has single-light windows either side with cusped heads; hood moulds are present to all doors and windows.

The three-stage west tower is banded with ironstone at its lowest stage. It features a two-light 19th-century Decorated-style west window, a small single-light window above and to the south, a clock face in a circular stone surround to the north, and two-light bell-chamber openings with cusped heads to the lights, a quatrefoil to the head, and hood moulds. The tower has offset angle buttresses and a battlemented parapet.

The interior preserves significant architectural and decorative features. The chancel has a hollow-chamfered piscina with a projecting bowl on a shaft. The chancel arch is double-chamfered with continuous outermost and polygonal responds, moulded capitals innermost. The nave contains a three-bay arcade to the south with octagonal piers, moulded bases and capitals, that to the west decorated with a quatrefoil and trefoil frieze, and double-chamfered arches to polygonal responds. A similar five-bay arcade to the north has chamfered bases. A plain tub font is attached to the west pier of the north arcade.

A tall 15th-century rood screen with single-light divisions survives, together with a 17th-century communion rail. A charity board and another board formerly in the tower commemorate a bell-ringing on 31st December 1790, signed by Richard Dunckley, Clerk, dated 12 May 1791. The church contains the Royal Arms of George III in oil on board.

The stained glass includes some medieval fragments to the heads of lights in the north chancel window, other 14th and 15th-century fragments in the south chancel window, and a stained-glass south-west chancel window dated 1851. Late 19th-century stained glass decorates the north-east chancel and the east window of the north aisle. Coloured glass appears in the heads of the clerestory windows and the east window of the north aisle. Old crown glass panes survive elsewhere, one inscribed "God Save the King/for Ever 1798".

The monuments include a brass on a chest tomb to Roger Wake (died 1504) and his wife Elizabeth, and an adjacent wide ogee-arched tomb recess. A stone wall monument commemorates Margaret Blackey, wife of Lional Blackey (died 1673), who "lived a Maide:18/yeares:a wife 20 and a wid/ow 61". Another stone wall monument records Rebecca, wife of Reverend Jonothan Yates, as "wife of my right hand and/ioy fortie and foure yeares/ten monthes and one week". A wall monument in oil on board commemorates Robert Watson, schoolmaster (died 1794), signed by Richard Dunkley.