Church of St Cenau, Llangenny

Church of St Cenau, Llangenny

Church of St Cenau is a Perpendicular style church comprising a nave and chancel under a single roof, with a south porch, north aisle, and north chapel. The north aisle and chapel are wider than the nave and chancel and represent the original nave and chancel of the building.

The exterior walls are built of rubble stone, battered at the base with large quoins in the nave and chancel, and coped gables. The roof is plain tile. All windows are finished with hood moulds. The porch is set to the left in the south nave wall and contains an almost round-headed south doorway with continuous moulding. To the right of the porch is a large four-light window, with a smaller two-light window further to the right. Between these windows is a small segmental-pointed window that was inserted to light the rood loft but is now blocked and fitted with iron bars.

The chancel contains a three-light south window and a priest's doorway to its left, which has a Tudor head and continuous stop-chamfer surround, with a boarded and ribbed door studded with iron. The chancel has a three-light early Perpendicular east window, while the chapel has a lower three-light Tudor east window. The north wall contains a two-light nineteenth-century window to the left of a nineteenth-century vestry. The north aisle, which is higher than the chapel, has in its north wall a three-light window flanked by small one-light windows, all renewed in the nineteenth century. At the west end of the north aisle is a nineteenth-century gabled bellcote in ashlar with a cross on the ridge, housing two bells in chamfered openings with two-centre heads.

The nave has a nineteenth-century two-light geometrical west window.

The porch has a ceiled wagon roof with moulded ribs. Stone bench seats are set into the east and west walls. The south doorway has a Tudor head with continuous stop-chamfer moulding and a door partly renewed but retaining original studs and strap hinges.

The nave arcade is three-bayed with octagonal piers (one of which is monolithic) on square bases with broach stops, moulded capitals, and two-centre arches with two orders of chamfers. The chancel has a similar two-bay arcade. The nave and chancel have a ceiled wagon roof with moulded cornice. The north aisle roof has exposed tie beams between later plaster infill. The north chapel has a cambered ceiling of plaster with moulded ribs. Between the aisle and chapel is a plain plastered two-centre arch (the original chancel arch) flanked by small squints. A patterned tile floor is laid at the west end of the nave and aisle and in the sanctuary, which was raised during nineteenth-century restoration.

A round Norman font with cable moulding around the rim stands on a nineteenth-century pedestal and base. A nineteenth-century pulpit has blind geometric tracery. In the chancel is the ogee head of a former piscina. A reredos in ashlar comprises four bays with blind cinquefoil arches on marble shafts except in the centre, where there is a foliage corbel with gold leaf. Texts of the Creed, Lord's Prayer, and Ten Commandments are painted on cream panels, with a cornice above bearing foliage decoration. A short screen from the chancel to the chapel has a doorway with a two-centre head and pierced tracery panels above a planked dado. The south door in the chancel has Gothic vertical panelling.

A tablet to Lewis Morgan (died 1688) in the east wall of the north aisle has an open pediment and achievement with family coat of arms and nag's head crest. An inscription on lead to John Morgan (died 1675) is fixed to the south wall of the chancel, taken from a vault beneath the chapel. Two oval tablets in the north wall of the north aisle commemorate Charles Herbert (died 1796) and Mary Phillips (died 1806), the latter made by Jones of Llangynidr. Numerous other nineteenth-century and early twentieth-century wall tablets are present. The north chapel contains grave slabs set into the floor, including that of Thomas Morgan (died 1704). Commemorative glass is found in the nave and chancel windows.