The Corpus of ROMANESQUE SCULPTURE in Britain & Ireland
Kent (now)
Parish church
Mersham is a large village about 3 miles E of Willesborough near Ashford, Kent. The church of St John the Baptist was described by Stephen Glynne in 1877 as 'rather a handsome church, with some singularities, and portions of various styles'. It has nave with S aisle, chancel with S chapel, tower and porch. There is a Romanesque S doorway.
Parish church
Lympne is a village situated about 0.5 mile N of West Hythe, less than 2 miles distant from the Channel coast. The church of St Stephen is a substantial building perched at the edge of a long downwards escarpment looking towards the coast. It comprises a nave, a central tower, a N aisle and a porch. There are two known 19thc restorations. Romanesque work includes the tower arches, tower windows, and font, together with some reset chip carving in the early Gothic N aisle window.
Parish church
Bapchild is a village on the old A2 about 1 mile SE of Sittingbourne. The church of St Lawrence has a nave and chancel with N aisle and chapel, a S tower with spire, and a S porch. Romanesque features include the nave arcade and N chapel. Note that the S tower has a blocked round-headed arch and a round-headed window with later tracery, suggesting that the lower level at least is of Romanesque date, but is entirely plain and contains no sculpture.
Parish church
Broadstairs is a coastal town in Thanet, NE Kent, formed from the inland old village of Thanet and small coastal settlements. The church of St Peter in Thanet is a large aisled building with a chancel, porch and a 15thc W tower of flint and ragstone. The N and S nave arcades are Romanesque.
Parish church
Leeds is a village 5 miles E of Maidstone. The church of St Nicholas, mainly built of ragstone with tufa, has an aisled nave, a chancel with chapels, and a low but massive square W tower. The only Romanesque surviving sculpture is in the W tower arch.
Parish church
Brabourne is a village sited 4.5 miles E of Ashford. The church of St Mary the Blessed Virgin has a wide and heavily-buttressed squat W tower, a nave and a chancel with a later S aisle. There are several items of interest, including both the W and the N doorways, the chancel arch and the tower arch.
Chapel, formerly parish church
Betteshanger is a scattered village near Deal. A settlement there is recorded in the Domesday return for Kent, but it is best-known today for the modern colliery which operated for much of the 20th century. The former parish church of St Mary consists of nave, chancel and small bell-tower and was completely rebuilt by Salvin in 1853. It now functions as a school chapel. Visiting only two years before its rebuilding, Glynne noted Norman doorways on both the N and S of the nave in 1851. Today, only the N doorway and its tympanum survives.
Parish church
Borden is a village 2 miles SW of Sittingbourne. The church of St Peter and Paul has aisled nave and chancel, a solid W tower and a S porch. Features of interest include the W doorway and the tower arch.
Redundant parish church
This is a church in an isolated farm setting NW of Faversham. Essentially a twin-cell building comprising a Romanesque core with a 13thc chancel, it contains evidence of many later alterations, not least due to the collapse of the N tower in 1806 and its sympathetic rebuilding at the W end of the nave in brick, complete with pointed windows and crenellations. As Tim Tatton-Brown has observed, the north and south walls of the west end of the nave must incorporate 12th-c fabric (including some re-used Roman brick). The only Romanesque sculpture is in the W doorway.
Parish church
The church of St Leonard is the oldest of several churches in the Kent coastal town of Deal, 8 miles NE of Dover. The building, which lies on the outskirts of the town, is complex and is the result of many centuries of modifications, not least in the Jacobean, Georgian and Victorian eras (collectively described by Glynne in 1877 as 'injudicious and tasteless alterations'). At the core of the church is a Romanesque nave and chancel. However, the nave is heavily cut back in the centre where a pillar has been removed on both N and S sides of the arcade and the entire church now liturgically re-orientated across the resulting axis N-S. Aisles were added in the 13thc, now much altered. The 17thc. tower, which is crowned by a distinctive white cupola, is believed to have replaced a 12thc original. The main Romanesque sculpture consists of the nave capitals and responds, together with a pillar piscina in the chancel.