The Corpus of ROMANESQUE SCULPTURE in Britain & Ireland
St Michael (medieval)
Chapel
All that remains of the 12thc. church is the chancel, and a few courses of the N wall of the roofless W tower. In the 13thc. the chancel was extended eastward, a chapel added on its S side and a S aisle added to the nave - all of red sandstone ashlar. The church fell into ruin and a replacement was built on a new site shortly after 1850. At this time the N doorway of the ruined nave was built into what became the W wall of the old chancel, now kept as a chapel with its 13thc. chapel adjoining to the S. In 1963 the dangerous walls of the old tower and nave were taken down, except for the old S doorway which still stands, supported by a portion of the S wall of the nave.
Ruined parish church
Burrow Mump is a striking landscape feature, apparently a natural hill, some 6 miles SE of Bridgwater. It is strategically placed immediately adjacent to the present A361 (which must represent an ancient route) and just N of the confluence of the Tone and the Parrett, two of the principal rivers of Somerset. The near terrain is part of the low-lying Levels, frequently flooded in winter; there are fine views towards Mendip to the N, the Quantock Hills to the W and NW, the hills to the S which run up to the border with Dorset & the several lias ridges in the E sector. The nearest settlement is Burrowbridge, at the foot of the hill on the SW side.
The ruined chapel stands on top of Burrow Mump, and according to VCH was substantially a 15thc building with a chancel, central tower, S transept and nave. A crypt was excavated outside the N wall of the nave and a N chapel on the N side of the chancel. It was rebuilt c.1663 and described as ruinous in 1733. In 1793 it was rebuilt again, as a single-celled structure with a W tower and an entrance in the centre of the S wall. In 1836-37 it was functionally replaced by a new church in Burrowbridge itself by Richard Carver, also dedicated to St Michael, and the Burrow Mump chapel fell into ruins again. It was given to the National Trust in 1946. What remains on site is of squared and coursed lias with red brick and Hamstone dressings. It consists of a W tower, a 3-bay nave and a S porch. The only features described here are two heads on the S face of the tower, which may be Romanesque.
Ruined parish church
Bix is a rural parish set in a typical Chilterns landscape of woodland and steep valleys, small road-side hamlets and isolated farms. The now ruined church of Bix Brand is a two-cell Romanesque structure with late medieval alterations and later rebuilding. The main structure is made from unknapped flints, with stone dressing and areas of brick and plaster.
Parish church
Sollers Hope is a small village set in a hilly pasture and woodland area, 8 miles SE of Hereford and 6 miles SW of Ledbury. Settlement is scattered, and the church and Court Farm which form the focus are reached via a series of increasingly narrow single-track roads. St Michaels has a chancel with a N vestry, and a nave with a S porch and a timber framed W bell turret with an octagonal spire. Otherwise construction is of coursed local sandstone rubble, roughly squared. The body of the church is 14thc, and it was restored by Nicholson and Son in 1885. They added the vestry, and replaced the spire and the wagon roofs. The only Romanesque feature here is the font.
Parish church
Kingstone is a good sized village 6 miles SW of Hereford, with the church at its centre. St Michael’s can best be described as confusing. It has two parallel vessels, separately roofed, separated by a 3-bay 12thc arcade. Each has its own chancel, again separately roofed, and at the W end of the N vessel is a 14thc tower. In the present arrangement the S vessel, slightly wider than the N, is the nave and the N vessel the aisle, which makes the chancel on the N side a chapel. It seems possible that the present N aisle was originally an aisleless nave, to which a S aisle was added in the later 12thc. This would explain the position of the tower, but not the fact that the chancel is offset to the S to abut the chancel of the S vessel. The RCHME analysis, accepted by Pevsner and Brooks, is that the S vessel was originally an aisleless nave, and the fact that it has a 12thc S doorway supports this. This doorway is the only Romanesque feature of the church. The tower was rebuilt by Cottingham in 1848-51, and there was a complete restoration in 1889-90 by Nicholson and Son.
Parish church
Brodsworth is an estate village five miles NW of Doncaster. The church is adjacent to the grounds of Brodsworth Hall (English Heritage), close to the site of a previous hall, which was demolished in 1860 on completion of the present one. In 2010 the University of Sheffield ran a Brodsworth Archaeology Landscape Project, which included excavation in the churchyard.
The church, of a creamy limestone, consists of chancel, nave, tower, N and S aisles extending into the chancel, and S porch. Both the nave and tower feature battlemented parapets and tile roof; the tower is considered to be late 12th or early 13thc. The nave is early Romanesque, whilst the N arcade and the long chancel are later medieval additions (see Comments).
Parish church
The church has W tower; nave with N aisle and a N transept or chapel; chancel, but no chancel arch. Entrance is by the N doorway; the S doorway is blocked at least since the improvement in the line of road to the N (now A166). There was a restoration of the N wall and tower by Temple Moore, 1896, when presumably the reset stones were discovered; and the chancel was rebuilt by Hodgson Fowler in 1901-2. Morris (1919, 326-7) does not mention the reset carved stones in the tower or N aisle, but this entry may have been repeated from his first edition. The nave S wall has two small 12thc windows, but these are much altered outside.
Two capitals from the N arcade are reset, its W respond remains; most if not all carved pieces reset in the interior N wall of the N aisle and in the tower are not corbels but are likely to be voussoirs. There is an arcaded cylindrical font.
Parish church
Bowness-on-Solway is a small on the Solway Firth village about 13 miles NW of Carlisle. The church lies to the S of the village and its fabric appears to include re-used Roman stones. The structure consists of a rectangular building under a single roof, which covers both the chancel and the nave. There are also a S porch and a W bell turret. Repairs were undertaken in the 18thc and there was extensive restoration work carried out in 1891, at which time a number of changes were made to the church, including the addition of a N transept. A watercolour sketch inside the church shows the building before changes were made. Surviving Romanesque sculpture is found on the S and N doorways, on the E and N windows and, inside the church, there is also a Romanesque baptismal font with carved decoration.
Parish church
Bracewell is a small Dales village of stone cottages, west of Skipton and near Barnoldswick. The church has a nave with N aisle, S porch and W tower; a chancel and a vestry. There is a Norman S doorway and a chancel arch; the font is probably 13thc.
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Parish church
Torpenhow is a village about 10 miles NE of Cockermouth, in the Lake District National Park. Parts of an early church survive within the present structure, including the W end of the chancel and the upper stonework of the nave arcades. The church was altered again in the 12thc, which included an E extension to the chancel and at least one of the two nave aisles. Further alterations were carried out in the 13thc, in the 15thc and in the 17thc. In 1882 and 1913, restoration works were undertaken. Carved stonework survives from the 12th-c church, such as the chancel arch, the S doorway, the W responds of both nave aisles and the baptismal font. There are also three Norman windows on the N side of the chancel, and evidence of similar, previous windows existing in the E and S walls of the chancel. Two colours of sandstone are used for many of the carved Romanesque features.