Church Of St Cuthbert

Church of St Cuthbert

An Anglican parish church in Wells, dating from the 13th century with substantial modifications, especially to the exterior, in the 15th century. Little obvious 19th-century restoration is evident.

The building is constructed primarily of Doulting ashlar stonework on most of the south side, with a rendered south transept and dressed rubble clerestory. The north side is mostly random rubble with ashlar dressings, while the chancel is entirely ashlar. The roofs are sheet lead of low pitch behind parapets.

The plan comprises a 3-bay aisled sanctuary with an added sanctuary, a 7-bay aisled nave with former transepts, and 2 bays of chapels on each side in addition. There are north and south porches and a west tower.

The exterior elevations date consistently to the 15th century, except for the south and north transepts and the north porch (actually the Treasury). The building features a plinth, sill course, and buttresses with two offsets, angled on corners to full height. A parapet string and panelled parapet run around the building. Most windows are 5-light designs with relatively simple Perpendicular tracery, though the sanctuary side walls have 3-light windows. All windows have 2-centre arched heads and arched labels running into the buttresses. The clerestory windows are similar but with 4-centre arched heads, divided by pilasters and pinnacles.

The Treasury has small cusped lancet windows and a 2-light plate-tracery window. Doorways are located under a window in the second bay of the south chancel aisle, in the south porch, and in the west wall of the tower.

The tower is the third highest in Somerset, comprising three stages, with the top stage occupying half the total height. Corner buttresses have four offsets crowned with small attached pinnacles against very tall square main pinnacles at each corner. A stair turret is positioned on the north-west corner. The west doorway is surmounted by a 6-light window and three niches. The lower stage is plain on the sides, with two small pointed arched windows to the second stage, followed by long 3-light bell openings visually extended downwards by blank panelling in cathedral style, with a transom band of quatrefoils. The whole is crowned by panelled battlementing.

The interior displays mixed 13th and 15th-century work. The chancel and its aisles are all 15th century, including the piers, which have four-wave mouldings. The crossing piers appear trimmed back; the crossing tower collapsed in 1561 and was presumably 13th century. The main nave piers are all 13th century, heightened by matching 15th-century work by another 3 metres, carrying a Somerset timber roof of low pitch with beams for every second principal. The roof is lavishly ornamented with angels, rosettes and shields, all fully coloured following a 1963 restoration by Alan Rowe.

The Treasury, in the position of a north porch and of 13th-century character, now serves as the choir vestry. Immediately eastwards is the 2-bay Chapel of the Holy Trinity of the 15th century, associated with the City Corporation. The north transept (St Catherine's Chapel) has the remains of a 13th-century reredos on its east wall, rediscovered in 1848. The south transept (The Lady Chapel) contains another stone reredos of 1470, based on the Stem of Jesse theme. St Cuthbert's Chapel, 2 bays west of the south transept, has a panelled ceiling of circa 1470. A fine tall tower arch in the west wall of the nave features an ornate lierne-vault with bosses to the tower space ceiling.

Notable fittings include the main altar reredos of 1867 by Forsyth; a fine carved wood pulpit of 1636 with an elaborate stair; two carved coats of arms of Charles I (1631) and Charles II; and an octagonal font on shaft of 15th-century style, though possibly largely 19th century.

Memorials include a medieval incised inscription to Thomas Tanner (late 14th century), an altar tomb of Thomas Leigh (died 1551) and his wife, a brass to Francis Hayes (died 1623) in a stone surround, a large stone monument with effigy to Luellin (died 1614, founder of nearby Llewellyn Almshouses), and an 18th-century monument to R Kingston signed by Nathaniel Ireson of Wincanton.

The church is noted by Pevsner and others as one of the finest medieval churches in Somerset, with a rich sequence of monuments.