St Ethelbert and All Saints (now)
Parish church
Belchamp Otten is a village in the Braintree district of N Essex, 4 miles W of Sudbury and 2.5 miles S of the Suffolk border. The three Belchamp villages occupy a network of minor roads in the rolling farmland on the S side of the River Stour. The church is in the centre of the village, and consists of a 12thc nave with a S porch of the late 14thc, and a bell turret over the W gable. The N doorway now serves as the entrance from the interior of the church to a modern brick vestry. At the W end of the nave interior is a 3-bay timber arcade that carries the bell turret, and on the N wall is a timber gallery reached by a ladder. The chancel is 13thc, and both it and the nave received replacement windows in the 14thc. Construction is flint rubble with the remains of a cement render, and limestone and clunch dressings. The S nave doorway is the only surviving Romanesque carved feature.