Church of St Crallo

Church of St Crallo

A cruciform church comprising a four-bay nave with north and south lean-to aisles, south porch, crossing tower, north and south transepts, and chancel. The structure combines early medieval work in roughly coursed rubble with Victorian rebuilding in coursed or snecked rockfaced stone with ashlar dressings. The roof is mostly Welsh slate with thicker slates to the porch, and features ashlar coping and gable finials.

The west gabled frontage displays three mullioned lancets within a deeply splayed arched surround with hoodmould. Below this is a west-facing pointed arched doorway of two orders with hoodmould and single detached shafts with shaft rings. Two tall flanking buttresses with saddleback hoods reach aisle roof height at the division of nave and aisles. Each aisle has a quatrefoil window under segmental pointed arched voussoirs. A continuous roll moulding runs along the battered plinth, with angle buttresses to the north and south featuring offsets and splayed bases.

The south nave contains a range of cinquefoil clerestory windows under segmental pointed arched roll mouldings, except for the east example which is a post-medieval two-light square-headed window with chamfered mullion. Bracket corbels at wallplate level carry gutters. The south aisle has three simple lancets with lightly cusped heads under heavy pointed arched roll mouldings and a moulded stone channel at gutter level. The gabled south porch has a two-ordered pointed arched doorway with roll-moulded hood featuring foliage stops and no piers, the arches dying out at impost level. Bracket corbels similar to those of the nave support the structure. Stone seats flank the sides, and the inner doorway is pointed arched with two orders of roll mouldings, hoodmould and face stops. The roof is a repaired timber arch-braced example with moulded principals and purlins.

The south transept, a nineteenth-century rebuild, has a steeply pitched roof with closely bracketed eaves and angle buttresses with battered plinth and roll-moulded stringcourse. A continuous stringcourse at the top of the buttresses becomes a hoodmould over a three-light south window with intersecting tracery and two trefoil-headed lancets to the east. The south chancel, with masonry partly medieval and partly nineteenth-century, features a hoodmould continuing over four closely set trefoil-headed lancets with chamfered surrounds and a pointed chamfered arched priests' door. Closely bracketed eaves are present, and at the southeast and northeast corners are unusual heavy splayed buttresses across the angle with divided offsets. The east window is large, containing three trefoil-headed lights with intersecting tracery beneath a hoodmould similar to the south transept, with kneelers and stringcourse at the top of the buttresses.

The tower, a nineteenth-century rebuild, is battlemented with a corbelled string beneath terminating in large corner gargoyles. It features two-light trefoil-headed openings under square hoodmould and relieving arch to the ringing chamber, with two-light square-headed chamfered mullioned windows below.

The north chancel is largely medieval masonry with a similar character to the south, though it has an added boilerhouse and no east windows. Splayed buttresses similar to those of the chancel cross the northeast and northwest angles. The north window has triple trefoil-headed lancets under a relieving arch. The north aisle has a range of four windows similar to the south aisle, a blocked central doorway, and moulded eaves channel. The north nave has bracketed eaves without clerestory lights, and features a rectangular staircase tower projection with a two-light mullioned square-headed window at the northeast.

The churchyard is surrounded by a rubble wall with saddleback coping in places and a high opening with later brick arch to the Rectory south (the site of the former College). The main entrance to the north has high gate piers of coursed stone with finials and iron double gates, while a further entrance to the west has rockfaced stone piers and an iron gate.

Interior

The nave of four bays is high and narrow, with north and south arcades of octagonal piers with plain moulded capitals and bases standing on rectangular plinths. Two-order arches with plain hoodmoulds rise from these piers, with one foliage stop only. At the east ends, the arches die into the wall with a face stop on the north side. The cinquefoil south clerestory lights sit in segmental pointed arched splays, while the quatrefoil west aisle windows sit in deep diamond-shaped splays. Aisle lancets all have deep splays. The south door has a higher segmental pointed arched surround.

The west windows contain engraved glass from 1963 by Frank Roper, while the aisle windows feature mid-twentieth-century stained glass by Celtic Studios. A memorial to Thomas Richards, the lexicographer who died in 1790, was created by Ieuan Rees in 1990. An early nineteenth-century stone benefaction tablet stands by the south door. The late medieval font is octagonal with a shaft broached to a rectangular base.

The wooden pulpit dates from 1871 and was made by Prichard. The open medieval wagon roof to the nave has nine panels with wooden foliage bosses at intersections and a shield-bearing angel (restored in the nineteenth century) at the base of each rib. At the east end of the nave, a two-bay ceilure sits over the former rood loft, with a high square-headed doorway in the north wall and a corner gallery at the northeast between two pointed arched doorways from stairs to the tower. The ground floor entrance is located in the wall behind the pulpit. The crossing is symmetrical, comprising four two-ordered pointed arches with hoodmoulds terminating in face stops, the arches dying into the walls. A nine-panelled roof supported on plain corbels with moulded beams and bosses covers the crossing.

The north transept contains a fourteenth-century effigy of a praying monk with fine detail on a plain tomb chest, probably from St Crallo's College. An effigy of Sir Thomas Evan, clerk of Coychurch who died in 1591, appears in flat relief with surrounding inscription. A eighteenth-century memento mori tablet to Richard Howell stands on the west wall. Eighteenth to nineteenth-century marble wall monuments to the Thomas family are present, including a large tablet with Doric entablature and crest to Edward Thomas and a neo-classical tablet to Morgan Thomas signed by E Morgan of Canton. The north window has a deep splay, and a nineteenth-century wooden screen is visible. The south transept has green and white quarries to its windows. Timber roofing to the transepts and chancel dates from the nineteenth century and results from Prichard's restoration.

The chancel and sanctuary have north and south windows with deep splays and segmental arched heads defined with continuous hoodmould. Closely set, they form an arcade with exposed stone dressings and one low-set face stop. On the north side, below a continuous sill, is a small pointed arched recess probably serving as an aumbry. On the south side is an arcade of piscina and sedilia consisting of four pointed chamfered arches under steep saddleback ridged hoods. The chancel and sanctuary have a decorative quarry-tiled floor with twentieth-century wooden furnishings to the sanctuary.

Two important early Christian crosses are housed within the church, reported in 1887 as being in the churchyard. The lower part of a cross shaft formerly east of the church and now in the south aisle bears key and interlace patterns and is believed to be inscribed with "Ebissar founder of church rests here" (translated from Latin), a name known in connection with the nearby foundation of Llantwit Major. A shaft formerly south of the church, reputedly marking the burial place of St Crallo the founder, now stands in the north aisle and features interlace and a Maltese cross head dating from the tenth to eleventh century. A replica of this shaft is held in the National Museum of Wales.