Listing Text

TL 65 NW WESTLEY WATERLESS

6/171 Parish Church of
19.8.59 St Mary the Less
(formerly listed as
Church of St Mary)

II*

Parish church; chancel early C13, nave and aisles C14, west gable
wall rebuilt c.1855 after collapse of C12 round tower. Chancel
reroofed C19. Flint, brick and rubble walls originally plastered;
clunch and Barnack limestone dressings. Slate and plain tile roofs.
Wooden spirelet with lead covering and iron cross. Nave of three
bays, arcades with two-centred arches of two chamfered orders, octagonal
piers with octagonal capitals moulded on four faces, chancel arch
similar but with grotesques on capitals. Windows of north and south
aisles foiled-two-lights in two-centred arches with fragments of C14
glass and Flemish glass. East window of three-lights; C13 lancet
window and C14 ogee-crocketed-niche in south wall of chancel. Aisles
and chancel with foiled piscinae. C14 stone effigy in south aisle.
Brass floor monument to Sir John de Crete and his wife c.1325,
noteworthy for being one of the earliest, possibly by Walter le Masun.
Font C13, octagonal with lightly carved panels. Three tomb covers
C13 fixed to west wall. Graffiti inscription on east reveal of
easterly south aisle window records in C14 arabic the produce of the
church vines. Small C19 pipe organ originally from Reach Congregational
Chapel.
Pevsner, Buildings of England, p.478
VCH, Vol. VI, p.180.
R.K.M. Davies, The Parish Church of Westley Waterless, 1970.
RCHM (Cambs. Notes, 1951).

Listing NGR: TL6179256222