Description

CHARSFIELD TM 25 NE 5/2 Church of St Peter 16/3/66 - I Church. C12, C13 and early C16. Rubble flint with ashlar dressings and English bond brick with a plain tile roof. Nave, chancel, south-western porch and west tower. Tower: of English bond brick with blue brick diapering. West face: projecting plinth with ashlar bands to the upper plinth, originally set with flushwork but most of the flint having now disappeared, the cavities blocked up with brick. Ashlar door surround at centre with hollow-chamfered and birdbeek mouldings. Hood-mould above, and floral motifs to the spandrels (weathered). Above is a 3-light window with cinquefoil heads to the lights and hoodmould with figurehead label-stops. Single lancet above that set in a rectangular chamfered surround and a 2- light belfry opening with chamfered surround and hoodmould. Brick band below belfry level and an ashlar string course below the level of the parapet which is battlemented and has panels of flushwork arcading. South face: similar belfry opening, partially masked by an open work wrought iron clock face. Gargoyle to the centre of the belfry string course. Blank walling to the lower body with a canted staircase turret at right. North face similar, save for absence of turret. East face abuts the church to its lower body and has to its upper body diapering in diamond patterns and a similar belfry opening to those on the other fronts. Nave: North face: lower walling of flint rubble and upper walling of brick in English bond. To right is a Perpendicular doorway with a moulded surround. To left of this is a single Romanesque lancet with arched head. Diagonal buttress to far right corner. Nave: South face: projecting gabled porch near centre with polygonal buttresses at either side and projecting plinth with panels of flushwork to the upper body. Geometrical designs, some panels having lost their flint infill. Central ashlar door surround with colonettes at either side and hollow chamfer with square bosses and floral motifs to the spandrels, now weathered. The polygonal buttresses terminate in domed, crocketed caps. Trefoil-headed niche above the doorway and crow-stepped gable with saddleback coping. The flanks have arcades of trefoil-headed openings to the lower body. To left of the porch is a 2-light Y-tracery window of c.1300 and below this are panels of flushwork, evenly spaced across the rubble walling. To right of the porch is a portion of what appears to be a Romanesque lancet window, which has been blocked and partially overlayed by a Perpendicular window of 3 lights with cinquefoil heads and hood mould. Chancel: slightly less wide with higher ridge but a steeper pitch of roof so that the eaves level is lower. South face: at left a Perpendicular window of 2 ogee-headed trefoil lights, slightly at right of which is a Priest's door with chamfered ashlar surround. Projecting buttress to right again and a window of 2 trefoil-headed lights to far right, a C19 replacement of that seen at left. North face: some herringbone rubble flintwork at right with a lancet at left and at left again a buttress. East face: 2 diagonal buttresses dying back into the corners. Central window of 3 lights with interlacing tracery of c.1300. Interior: Porch: C19 outer doors. Roof, trusses with long wall posts. Pendant beams connected to the collar and to the wall posts by angle braces. Wave and cavetto mouldings to the door surround. Nave: roof of 6 1/2 bays with wallposts rising from corbels in the form of gremlins, connected by arch braces to hammerbeams which support hammer posts connected to the collar beams (which are not visible) by further arched braces. Further arched braces run along the wall surface connecting the wall posts. Carved purlins. Chancel roof: whitewashed wagon roof. Font: octagonal stem and bowl, all now whitewashed. Figures against the stem (defaced). Angels with interlacing wings below the bowl. Signs of Evangelists and angels with scrolls to the bowl panels. Dividing nave and chancel, is the northern half of the lower body of the rood screen having 6 panels divided into pairs. Wall memorials to Leland family in chancel. John and Theopilia Leland, c.1690. Black marble tablet with ashlar surround with curtains at either side, scroll brackets, apron with cartouche and coat of arms and palm leaves and broken pediment with urn to top. William Leland, c.1730. White marble tablet, brackets at either side and pediment above with central coat of arms to tympanum and apron with separate tablet to his son Naunton Leland.

SOURCES: Nikolaus Pevsner, Buildings of England: Suffolk, 1979 H Munro Cautley, Suffolk Churches, 1982

Listing NGR: TM2542156574

External Links

• Wikidata Q17526985

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