• Home
• News
• About
• Searching and Browsing
  • Find a Location
  • Find a Feature
  • Find a Word
  • Browse
  • Progress Status
• Resources
• Contact Us

I Location

II General Description

The earliest elements of the church, dating fromc.1200, are the two N chancel windows (bobbin shaft-rings and crocket capitals), and the E responds of the N aisle. Pieces of Romanesque sculpture, however, are incorporated within the fabric of the chancel and N transept.

IV Interior Features

5. Interior Decoration

a. String courses

(i) Below S and N chancel windows

Beneath the S and N windows of the chancel runs a string course carved with palmettes. There are 17 lengths on the S and 14 on the N. These are clearly reused and, moreover, not reused in their original sequence, as several different designs of palmette, some with and some without an upper border, are awkwardly juxtaposed. The predominant version has five rounded, hollow leaves and a stem, which continues to form a cusped frame for the motif. Variations on this include drilled holes above the lower pair of leaves, spandrel motifs (e.g. fluted triangles or drop shapes) between the palmettes, and two volutes or curled leaves replacing the lowest pair of rounded leaves at the base. Some palmettes have seven rounded leaves, while others, more correctly lilies or fleurs-de-lis, have three: a central pointed leaf flanked by two downward curling volutes.

Dimensions

V Furnishings

1. Fonts

(i)

Three carved stones, set into the interior W wall of the 13thc. N transept, represent the remains of a carved tub font. The upper border is carved with cable motif. Below this, the sides of the bowl are carved with fat arches, which interlace and alternately descend onto block capitals supported by geminated shafts, or through annulets, beneath which they sprout downward-sweeping volutes. The lower part of the bowl is missing. The L stone contains one full and two half arches; the central stone contains one full and two three-quarter arches, and the R stone contains two three-quarter arches, one of which is broken. The three pieces, if reconstructed, would not quite complete the circumference of the font.

Dimensions

VII History

VIII Comments/Opinions

The windows in the N wall of the chancel and the E respond of the nave arcade, representing the remains of an arcade, date from c.1200. The window shafts have bobbin-rings and carry crocket capitals; the E respond of the N arcade consists of five capitals on keeled shafts, the four lateral capitals having smooth leaves developing into crockets, foliate volutes or sprays on the upper angles, and the central semi-circular capital being simply moulded at top and bottom. The palmette string course which was re-used as a sill for the existing chancel windows can be dated to the second quarter of the 12thc. on stylistic grounds. Comparable work is the frieze above the relief of Christ visiting Martha and Mary in Chichester Cathedral. There is no evidence for the original position of the string course.

There are no parallels for the font in Sussex. Smooth, fat stems bound by rings recur at Sompting (reset fragment in chancel and rear of Christ in Majesty relief in nave), but the design here is different.

IX Bibliography