Church Of St Agatha

Church of St Agatha

A church dating from the 12th century around 1200, with significant additions in the 13th and late 14th centuries, and restored in 1869 by Sir G G Scott. Built of rubble with artificial slate, stone slate and lead roofs.

The church comprises a 3-bay nave with a west bellcote, a 2-storey south porch, a south aisle, a north transept, and a 3-bay chancel.

The west end of the nave is 12th-century work, with pilaster buttresses flanking a lancet window with head-stops to the label. A 19th-century 2-light bellcote is set above. The south porch dates to the late 14th century and features an offset buttress to the left, a double-chamfered pointed-arch doorway under a label with shield stops, and a trefoil-headed niche above. A chamfered first-floor light is present, with a line of Perpendicular roof work below a 19th-century gable. The west wall contains an early medieval grave cover set into the plinth and a chamfered stair vent. Inside the porch, a chamfered pointed-arch doorway opens to the east wall, with two aumbry-like openings in the west wall. There is a chamfered and shafted south nave doorway of around 1200 with head-stops to the label and an original door. The porch has a barrel vault.

The south aisle is late 14th-century, with bays divided by offset buttresses. Two 2-light Perpendicular windows with hood-moulds are present, along with a 2-light window with chamfered mullions. A 19th-century ashlar parapet runs along the top, with a flat lead roof. At the east end of the aisle, medieval grave covers with foliate crosses are built into the plinth, and a 3-light Perpendicular window is set above. The nave roof is covered in artificial slate with ashlar copings.

The north wall of the nave contains two lancet windows with head-stops to the labels. The north transept dates from the early 14th century and features a plinth and first-floor offset. A ground-floor window has 3 trefoiled lights, with a small first-floor lancet above.

The south side of the chancel is 12th-century work with quoins to the right. A low small lancet is present, alongside round-headed windows with hood-moulds flanking a chamfered pointed-arch priest's doorway with head-stops to the label and a pilaster buttress to the right. A 2-light Perpendicular window and a pilaster buttress are also present. The chancel roof is covered in stone slate with ashlar coping and a gable cross. The east end of the chancel has pilaster buttresses flanking an early 13th-century round-arched window of 3 pointed lights, with head-stops to the label. The north side of the chancel is early 13th-century, with, from east to west, a hollow-chamfered round-headed window, a shallow projection of an internal tomb recess with a stone roof, two similar windows, and a low small lancet.

Interior

The interior features a 3-bay arcade of early 14th-century double-chamfered arches with labels and original chevron stencils on late 13th-century octagonal piers with crude capitals. A smaller late 13th-century double-chamfered arch leads to the south chapel, while an early 14th-century double-chamfered arch opens to the north transept. A 19th-century Early English-style chancel arch was inserted.

A 12th-century bench table runs along the west wall and returns along part of the north wall. The outline of a round-arched north doorway is visible. The south doorway has a chamfered segmental rear-arch and an octagonal stoup. A pointed-arch doorway with a 14th-century door leads to the porch staircase. Above the south door is a Queen Anne coat of arms. A chamfered unglazed window in the west wall of the south aisle opens from the porch chamber.

A Romanesque lead-lined font with delicate arcading on twisted colonettes and a palmette frieze sits on a later stem. The south chapel is enclosed by 2- and 3-light Perpendicular wooden screens with fragments of cresting. A trefoil-headed piscina with nailhead decoration is present, along with a brass to Mrs Eleanor Bowes dated 1623 on the south wall.

The chancel features a trefoil-headed piscina with roll moulding and 3-seater sedilia with trefoil-headed arches and mid-13th-century paintings of bishops. A tomb recess with a lidless coffin is located on the north side.

A plaster cast of the around 700 Easby Cross, now in the Victoria and Albert Museum, is displayed within the church. The east window contains 3 small panels of medieval glass: 12th-century figures of St John and a Premonstratensian Canon, and a 15th-century angel.

Wall Paintings

The church possesses a unique collection of mid-13th-century frescoes in the chancel, discovered during the 19th-century restoration and delicately restored by Burlinson and Grylls. The reveals of the two easternmost north windows display 4 Rogationtide figures depicting Sowing, Pruning, Digging and Hawking. Scenes from the Garden of Eden are painted on the north wall, while scenes from the Nativity and Passion are depicted on the south wall.

The church was served by Premonstratensian Canons from Easby Abbey.