The Corpus of ROMANESQUE SCULPTURE in Britain & Ireland
St Albans (now)
Parish church
Meesden is a village in the East Hertfordshire district of the county, 5 miles NE of Buntingford, 8 miles N of Bishop’s Stortford, and half a mile from the Essex border. The church stands at the end of a lane, half a mile E of the village centre, close to the course of a Roman road that runs NE from Brent Pelham.
St Mary’s consists of a 12thc nave with short transeptal chapels of the 13thc, the N now a vestry and the S an organ room. The brick S porch is an attractive addition of the early 16thc, and over the W gable is a shingled timber bell turret with an upper traceried stage and a shingled pyramid spire. This feature dates from the restoration of 1877. The chancel was rebuilt c.1300 and includes an important tiled pavement of the early 14thc. Apart from the features mentioned above, construction is of flint rubble with stone dressings. The church is now part of the benefice of Anstey, Brent Pelham, Hormead and Wyddial. The only Romanesque feature found was the S doorway.
Parish church
Apart from the 15thc. W tower (c.1470) the church was entirely
rebuilt in 1862 by W. Slater. A number of 12thc. fragments survive from the
original church and are currently located on windowsills in the N aisle. All
are carved from Totternhoe stone.
Parish church
Willian is a small village in the North Hertfordshire district, on the southern edge of Letchworth Garden City. The church is in the village centre, and is built of flint rubble with ashlar facings. It consists of a chancel with a N vestry, a nave with a S porch, and a W tower with a polygonal NE stair turret. The chancel has been traditionally dated to the 12thc on the basis of the blocked, round-headed S doorway, but its deep chamfer makes such an early date unlikely. Otherwise there is nothing in the fabric to indicate a date before the 13th - 14thc for the present building. The tower and S porch are 15thc and the vestry 19thc. Fragments of an early building are seen in chevron voussoirs re-used as facing material on the N side of the nave.
Parish church
Stevenage was the first of the post-war New Towns built to relieve pressure on housing in London after the blitz. It was begin in 1946 in the face of much local pressure from the residents of what was then a town of 6000 inhabitants on the Great North Road, whose prosperity had historically been built on the stage coach service. The New Town was built in 6 neighbourhoods, mainly to the S and E of the Old Town (whose High Street still remains). The parish church of St Nicholas is in a village-like setting to the NE of the Old Town.
It consists of a nave and chancel in one, both aisled, separated by a screen and with no chancel arch. The chancel has 2-bay aisles to chapels on N and S; the S chapel converted for uses as an organ room and vestry. to the E of the S chapel is a small modern vestry. The 4-bay nave has clerestories, and there is a S porch at the W end of the aisle and a S transeptal chapel, extended to the E. The W tower is 12thc (of the plain lancets, all but the lower N window are replacements) and square in plan with diagonal buttresses added at the western angles. It has an embattled parapet and a leaded spire (releaded in 1899). The nave aisles were added in the 13thc, and their arches remodelled in the 15thc when the clerestories were added. The N chancel chapel has 14thc tracery in the windows, and both chancel arcades are of that date, while the S transept dates from 1841. The S porch appears modern. but may simply be heavily restored. Construction is of flint with ashlar dressings, but the S transept and the E wall of the chancel are rendered. The battllements of the S transept are of brick. Clunch piers in the nave and chancel arcades have been lavishly graffitied, apparently in the Middle Ages. The transept and its modern eastern extension are now given over to parish use as meeting rooms. The Romanesque features described here are the W tower doorway, the tower arch and the font.
Parish church
The church has a chancel with an attached vestry on S, nave with attached organ
chamber at the E end, and a wooden N tower with a tall spire over the N porch. The E
end of the nave is probably 12thc. with a 19thc. (1874) extension to the W. The
chancel was also probably 12thc. originally. The chancel arch was rebuilt in the
16thc. The organ chamber, N porch and vestry are 19thc. Much of the exterior is
rendered, the area around the N doorway is uncoursed flint. The N doorway is the only Romanesque feature.
Parish church
The church has a chancel with attached vestry, nave with N aisle and S porch, and W tower. The nave is 12thc., the N aisle late 13thc. and the W tower and chancel 15thc. (The lower part of the tower is late 14thc. and the top stage is 19thc.) The chancel was remodelled in the 17thc. The porch is late 16thc. or early 17thc. A restored doorway in the S wall of the nave may be partially 12thc., and 12thc. material survives in the S wall and NE and NW angles of the nave. The exterior is rendered apart from the N wall which is flint with brick buttresses, and the top stage of the tower which is flint and ashlar.
Parish church
The church has chancel with N vestry, nave with clerestorey and N and S aisles, and W
tower. It is substantially 13thc., apart from the chancel and
vestry which are 14thc. There is some modern work in the
chancel. Some 12thc. masonry survives in the nave and 12thc.
sculpture is found on the reset N doorway and on a carved panel set into the exterior S
wall.
Parish church
The church has chancel (with modern vestry on N), nave, N and S aisles and W tower. The 13thc. chancel (extended in the 14thc.), has a late 12thc. chancel arch with keeled respond shafts and stiff-leaf capitals. The nave was originally aisleless, and the quoins surviving in its outer W wall may date from the 11thc. The N and S aisles are 15thc., as is the W tower. The church was extensively restored in 1875 by Ewan Christian. The late 12thc. S doorway, reset when the aisles were built, has also been restored.
Parish church
The church has a chancel with an organ chamber on the N, nave with N vestry and S porch,
and W tower. The nave and chancel are the same width and there is no chancel arch.
The chancel and W tower are 14thc. the organ chamber, vestry and S porch are 19thc.
The church is built of coursed flint and stone rubble and Barnack stone. Some of the
nave walling survives from the original 12thc. church. 12thc. sculpture is found on a
pillar piscina and a reset fragment in the S wall of the nave.
Parish church
The church has nave, chancel, N and S aisles and W tower. Of the original 12thc. church traces survive in the masonry of the E end of the nave. The chancel arch, N and S aisles, chancel and chancel arch are 13thc. and the clerestorey and W tower are 15thc. Romanesque sculpture is found on the retooled font.