Description

WATERPERRY
SP60NW
6/190 Church of St. Mary
18/07/63

GV I

Church. Saxon, early C13 and early C14, restored 1840. Limestone rubble with
ashlar dressings and some weatherboarding; artificial stone-slate and lead
roofs. Nave, chancel, south aisle and west tower. C13 chancel has 3 original
lancets in each of the side walls, plus a fourth to south dated from the C19
rebuilding of the east wall with its 3-light window of Reticulated tracery;
blocked priests door to north. The steep-pitched roof has the base of a sanctus
bellcote on the west gable parapet. The south aisle has an early C14 east window
of 3 lights with a large sexfoil in the tracery, and, to south, a low C15 window
of 2 ogee lights and a 3-light C15/early C16 window of 3 cinqefoil lights; C14
south doorway has a keeled roll dying into wave-moulded jambs. The north wall of
the nave has 2 more identical windows with sexfoils in the tracery and a blocked
C14 doorway. At the east end of the wall is a rectangular stair projection. The
west wall has a 3-light window with Perpendicular tracery between deep stepped
and gabled buttresses; to right is a C14 doorway and the central gable is taken
up to form the base of the weatherboarded tower which has a shallow pyramid
roof. Interior: Chancel has a plastered 7-canted roof, with 3 heavy tie beams,
and a late-medieval aumbry in the north wall. C14 chancel arch springing from
corbel heads is set beneath a high Saxon arch with plain imposts. Transitional
3-bay arcade has fluted and scalloped capital to east and masonry pier to west.
King-post roof to nave, probably C16. West tower is supported on internal posts
with large curved braces. Fittings include C18 panelled pine box pews, reading
desk dated 1632, elaborately-canopied pulpit inscribed "GM/1677", C17
barley-twist communion rails, late C18 Gothic screen forming entrance lobby
(removed from former chapel in Waterperry House (q.v.)), and a painted Royal
Arms dated 1757. Stained glass in windows include C13, C14, C15 and C16 figures,
shields and quarries, plus some C19 and C20 glass, Monuments include C14
full-length effigy under elaborate double-cusped and crocketted canopy; C17
alabaster wall monuments to Sir Francis Curson, with kneeling figures, and to
Magdalen Curson with framed inscription; large marble group by Chantry dated
1821; a series of brasses including one palimpsest, plus many C17, C18 and C19
ledgers to Cursons and others.
(V.C.H.: Oxfordshire, Vol.V, pp,306-8; Buildings of England: Oxfordshire,
pp,826-8).

Listing NGR: SP6295306319

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• Wikidata Q17528935

External links are from the relevant listing authority and, where applicable, Wikidata. Wikidata IDs may be related buildings as well as this specific building. If you want to add or update a link, you will need to do so by editing the Wikidata entry.

Recommended Books

• 
  Surrey (The Buildings of England) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Hertfordshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Derbyshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Bedfordshire, Huntingdonshire, and Peterborough (Pevsner Architectural Guides) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Suffolk: West: The Buildings of England (Pevsner Architectural Guides) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Somerset: South and West (Pevsner Architectural Guides) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)