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Search terms: Interior decoration, Northamptonshire

1. St John the Baptist, Barnack, Northamptonshire, England

Parish church
St John the Baptist's church has an early 11thc. W tower with an octagonal upper storey and broach spire of c. 1200, an 11thc. nave to which aisles were added, the N in the late 12thc. and the S, along with its porch, in the 13thc. The chancel has a 12thc. N chapel and a broad S chapel (the Walcot Chapel) of c. 1500. The chancel was lengthened and a wider chancel arch built c. 1300. Shortly afterwards the E part of the S nave aisle was widened to form a chapel, and the N chancel chapel was also rebuilt at this time, with a vestry added to the E of it. There was a major restoration in 1853-55, which included the removal of a 13thc. wall blocking the tower arch and the strengthening of the tower walls with iron bands. In the 1935-37 restoration these bands were removed and a number of openings unblocked.
2. St Peter with St James, Brackley, Northamptonshire, England

Parish church
Brackley is a town in the far S of the county, sited in a loop of the Great Ouse, which forms the border with Buckinghamshire. It is an ancient site on the main road from Northampton to Oxford, and evidence of Iron Age and Roman settlement has been found in the town. There seem to have been two centres to it; one around St Peter's church towards the E of the present town, and the other on its southern edge, overlooking the river, around the site of the Norman castle, of which a motte 3m high and 40m in diameter survives.
3. St Kyneburgha, Castor, Northamptonshire, England

Parish church
St Kyneburgha's is described by Pevsner as the most important Norman parish church in the county (i.e. Huntingdonshire). An aisleless cruciform church was built in the early 12thc. and dedicated in 1124. In the 1220s a S aisle was added and the chancel replaced; in the 1260s the S transept was replaced by a large chapel with an E aisle; and early in the 14thc. a N aisle was added. A broach spire was added to the tower around 1350, and the nave clerestoreys were inserted in the mid-15thc. The tower is of ashlar, the rest of the church of stone rubble.
4. St John the Baptist, Cranford, Northamptonshire, England

Parish church
St John's has a clerestoreyed nave with three-bay aisles, the N arcade with a short 12thc. W bay separated from the eastern part of the arcade by a short length of wall. The two E bays are also round-headed, with stiff-leaf capitals of c.1200. The S nave arcade is round-headed too, but the capitals and the aisle date from the restoration of 1842. The chancel has N and S chapels; the N, of two bays has an arcade of c.1300, and is now used for a crèche and vestry. The S of one bay, housing the organ, is 19thc. Both nave doorways are under porches, but the N porch has been extended eastwards and converted for use as a kitchen and lavatories. The W tower is 13thc. in its lower parts, with 14thc. bell-openings and added diagonal buttresses, and a quatrefoil frieze and embattled parapet added at the top. The only feature described below is the N nave arcade.
5. All Saints, Earl's Barton, Northamptonshire, England

Parish church
The well-known Anglo-Saxon W tower, which is profusely decorated with raised flat bands (lesenes), may originally have formed the nave of the church. The present nave is essentially Norman, but has added aisles with late-13thc. or early-14thc. arcades and Dec. windows. The chancel is also Norman, but was lengthened in the 13thc. Romanesque features described here are the blind arcading and sedilia within the chancel, with their associated stringcourses and some re-set chevron voussoirs or jamb-stones; the south nave doorway and the tower and chancel arches.
6. St Nicholas, Great Doddington, Northamptonshire, England

Parish church
St Nicholas' has an aisled nave with clerestoreys, chancel and W tower. The nave arcades, aisle windows (where original) and N and S doorways all date from the early 14thc. The S doorway is protected by a porch. The chancel is of a similar date, but the short and stocky three-storey tower is 12thc. in its lower parts, with a round-headed window in the W wall. The W doorway is a 13thc. insertion, and the diagonal buttresses are also later additions. The tower was re-pointed in 1685, according to an inscription on the S face. The saddleback roof described by Bridges was replaced in 1737. The present rooflines are owed to the restoration of 1871. The only piece of Romanesque sculpture is a scallop capital reset in the jamb of the S nave doorway.
7. St Peter and St Paul, King's Sutton, Northamptonshire, England

Parish church
The church has a tall W tower with a slender spire supported by delicate flying buttresses and decorated with pinnacles and crockets. This late 14thc. work, described by Pevsner as 'one of the finest, if not the finest, spire in this county of spires'. It was partly rebuilt in 1898 and repaired in 1968. To the W of the tower is a Perpendicular porch. The nave aisles extend W alongside the tower. The N nave arcade dates from around 1300, and the S arcade has the same tall, spacious proportions, but in this the piers and arches of a 12thc. arcade have been reused. The chancel arch is also c.1300, but the chancel itself is 12thc., with internal wall-arcading, much restored and with arches that are entirely 19thc., and an external corbel table, completely reset. The font is 12thc., simple and unusually wide.
8. St Michael and All Angels, Sutton, Northamptonshire, England

Parish church
St Michael's has an early 12thc. nave with a 13thc. bell-cote on the W gable. A S aisle with a two-bay arcade was added at the end of the 12thc., and the nave was heightened and a clerestorey added in the 15thc. The chancel arch is a fine piece by the Castor workshop. To the S of the chancel is a large 13thc. chapel converted to house the organ, and vestry. Construction is of coursed irregular blocks of Barnack limestone. The chancel and S aisle were restored in 1865-68. In addition to the chancel arch the church has a set of 12thc. corbels set high in the S wall of the nave, a small doorway reset in the S aisle wall, and inside a recumbent lion, perhaps from an elaborate doorway.
9. St Lawrence, Towcester, Northamptonshire, England

Parish church
St Lawrence's is a large ironstone church with a tall W tower, a clerestoreyed and aisled nave with four-bay arcades, and a chancel with N and S chapels and a N vestry. The S chapel contains the tomb of William Sponne (d.1448); the N now houses the organ. None of this is earlier than the 13thc. (the chapel arcades); the tower is Perpendicular and the windows 14thc.-15thc. Earlier material has been reused, however. Two elaborately-carved 12thc. shafts have been incorporated into the (largely 19thc.) chancel arch; three of the capitals of the nave arcades are recycled 12thc. pieces; and several chevron voussoirs have been incorporated into the masonry above the arcade in the S aisle.
10. St John the Baptist, Wakerley, Northamptonshire, England

Parish church
St John's has a clerestoreyed nave with N and S aisles or chapels, just two bays long and situated at the E end, in what Pevsner calls a transeptal position. The arcades are 14thc.-15thc., and they have been pierced through 12thc. walls; on the S side a 12thc. window can be seen above the arcade pier. The chancel arch is now pointed, its arch decorated with chevron, but presumably it was originally round. The figural and foliage capitals are important sculptures by the Castor workshop. There are 12thc. blind arches to either side of the chancel arch, probably, according to Pevsner, originally reredoses for side altars. The chancel has been rebuilt, perhaps in the 15thc. At the west, the tower is 14thc. in its lower parts and 15thc. above, with a crocketed spire rising behind a battlemented parapet. Romanesque sculpture is found on the chancel arch; in the corbels now in the S aisle and more re-set outside in the E wall of the S aisle; and in sections of string course set in the interior of the S aisle and the exterior E walls of both aisles.
11. St Mary the Blessed Virgin, Warmington, Northamptonshire, England

Parish church
St Mary's has an aisled and clerestoreyed nave, the arcades of five bays and now on very tall piers; octagonal on the N side and cylindrical on the S. The piers and the pointed arches date from well into the 13thc., but most of the capitals are reused 12thc. pieces. The remodelling of the arcade is contemporary with the aisle windows, which are also slightly earlier on the S. Both nave doorways are 13thc. and set under 13thc. vaulted porches, but the S is larger and more elaborately carved. The chancel has a Perpendicular S chapel, now used for the organ. The W tower is of three storeys with a broach spire, and largely belongs to the second half of the13thc. Construction is of coursed stone rubble, with ashlar for the top storey of the tower, the spire and the S chapel. The church was restored by Sir George Gilbert Scott in 1875-76. 12thc. sculpture is found in the nave arcade capitals and possibly also in reset corbels high on the interior aisle walls.
12. St Mary the Virgin, Weekley, Northamptonshire, England

Parish church (benefice of Geddington with Weekley)
Weekley is a small village in the N of the county, just outside the conurbation of Kettering on the NE, and within the ancient forest of Rockingham. It stands on the W bank of the river Ise, overlooking its valley. The church is just outside the village on the N side, and there is a moated site at the SE edge of the village. St Mary's has an aisled and clerestoreyed nave with three-bay Perpendicular arcades; the aisles extending eastwards to form chapels alongside the chancel. The S doorway is of c.1200 and protected by a 19thc. porch. The chancel has one 13thc. lancet, but the chancel arch and the E end were rebuilt by Blomfield in 1873. The S chapel contains the organ now, but the north houses the grand tomb of Sir Edward Montagu (d.1601) and his wife Elizabeth (d.1618) with effigies of both under a canopy, as well as other Montague memorials. In the E wall of this chapel a 12thc. carved stone has been set. At the W end, the tower is 14thc., with a short spire behind the battlement.
13. St Martin, Welton, Northamptonshire, England

Parish church (benefice of Daventry, Ashby St Ledgers, Braunston, Catesby, Hellidon, Staverton and Welton)
Welton is an extensive village in the W of the county, a mile N of Daventry. It stands on rising ground in the angle between two branches of the Grand Union canal, in hilly pasture land. The village is locally known as the maze, from the labyrinthine street-plan based on a figure-of-eight. The church stands in the centre of this, and the manor site at the southern edge. The nave is Perpendicular, with tall, four-bay arcades, no clerestorey and nave and aisles sharing a single roof. A clerestorey would not anyway be needed, as the big panelled aisle windows provide plenty of light. The line of an earlier nave roof is visible on the tower. The S doorway has a porch, the N does not. The chancel is also perpendicular, with a N vestry in the angle between nave and chancel. The W tower is earlier, dating from the beginning of the 14thc. Inside the nave is a re-set human head corbel which may be 12thc.
14. St Mary, Whittlebury, Northamptonshire, England

Parish church (benefice of Silverstone and Abthorpe with Slapton and Whittlebury and Paulerspury). Formerly a dependent chapel of Green's Norton.
Whittlebury is a village in the S of the county, a mile from the Buckinghamshire border on the A413 road from Buckingham to Towcester. A large part of the medieval parish was occupied by Whittlewood Forest, where assarting was recorded as early as the 13thc. and probably took place before that. Remains of the forest are mostly to the S and E, forming a ring of discrete woods and copses. The settlement itself was centred on the area of the church, at the N end of the modern village, where finds by the Whittlewood Project indicate Iron Age habitation. The church consists of a 12thc.-13thc. W tower, an aisled nave with no clerestorey, offset from the line of the tower and a square-ended chancel, largely of 1878. Pevsner describes the church as "restored beyond redemption", but it retains some Romanesque features. A datestone suggests that the N aisle was rebuilt in 1638. The church was repaired and refurnished in 1832, and a vestry was added in 1850. The entire church was restored in 1878. The tower arch is included here, although it may be 13thc., and a sawtooth stringcourse above it. The N nave arcade includes a waterleaf capital.