The Corpus of ROMANESQUE SCULPTURE in Britain & Ireland
Oxfordshire (now)
Parish church
Only five miles N of Oxford, Yarnton is outside the city in a quiet rural situation. St Bartholomew’s was originally a small Romanesque church of nave and chancel. It was expanded in the C13th by the addition of a four bay arcade. The present S aisle may represent the Romanesque nave, as its S wall preserves a plain late C12th doorway, and also two deeply splayed windows, now with C19th lights. The N wall of the chancel has a round-headed window, possibly reusing C12th stonework. In 1611 Sir Thomas Spencer had a spacious chapel built as a setting for the family monuments, E of the S aisle and alongside the chancel. The Romanesque font is now sited within it.
Parish church
Sydenham is located 3 miles SE of Thame in SE Oxfordshire. The church is a small building of flint and stone, with a wooden central tower with a broach-spire, dating mainly from the C13th and restored in the C19th. It boasts some Romanesque corbels in the chancel (Sherwood and Pevsner), but these are of wood and of doubtful date and so not included in this entry. However, there is a plain tub font, probably Romanesque.
Parish church
Shrivenham is a large village in the Vale of the White Horse, about 5 miles SW of Faringdon, and close to the county boundary with Wiltshire. Of the medieval church the 14thc central tower remains, and it is surrounded by a broad and long gabled church built from 1638 by Lord Craven. The W front of the nave appears to preserve sone 1thc masonry, and the rooflines of the medieval church remain on the tower walls. The only Romanesque sculpture is on the 12thc. font.
Parish church
The village of Shutford is 4.5 miles W of Banbury. St Martin's church dates from the late C12th and for many centuries it constituted a chapelry within Swalcliffe parish. The small stone building now comprises a chancel, nave, a narrow N aisle with a tower at its W end, and a wide N transept or chapel built at an angle towards the NNE. In the C13th the N aisle was extended eastwards by one bay, the N transept was added and the nave rebuilt. The surviving parts from the late Romanesque are the Transitional N aisle with an arcade of two pointed arches supported by a round pier and responds with scallop capitals, and a round-headed W window in the ground stage of the tower, probably the original W window of the N aisle. There is also a Romanesque font.
Parish church
This cruciform church of limestone rubble stands high above the west bank of the Cherwell, 8 miles north of Oxford. It now comprises the chancel, built up due to the sloping ground, central tower, N and S transepts, and a clerestoried nave with a S aisle. The N and S walls of the nave may be partly pre-Conquest. Although it was probably originally aisleless, on the N side remain two blocked arches, visible both on the outside and inside walls. These may represent either porticus arches, or arches of a N arcade built c. 1120. Whatever their nature, the extensions were demolished in the early C13th.
A similar situation may have pertained on the S side because the S arcade and aisle were also built or rebuilt at the time of the demolition, when also the chancel was extended eastwards and the nave westwards. The N nave doorway of c. 1120 is thought to have been reset within the NW blocked nave arch also at the same time. The arch of another early Romanesque doorway, decorated with roll mouldings, is now set in the E wall of the churchyard. On the nave interior there are small round-headed arches, one each on N and S walls, just below the clerestorey windows. The W bay of the chancel on the S side still retains a C12th pilaster buttress. A further Romanesque detail is the three beakheads reset on the S face of the second stage of the tower.
Parish church
The villages of East and West Lockinge are just outside Wantage to the E. The village in its present form is a creation of Lord and Lady Wantage c.1860. Their home was Lockinge House - originally of 1730 but greatly enlarged by Lord Wantage. This was demolished in 1947, and the church of All Saints' in East Lockinge stands next to its site. All Saints originally had a single nave and chancel to which a W tower was added in 1564. In 1853 a new nave was added to the S, the old church then becoming the N aisle. In 1886 another aisle with an arcade of oak was added to the S. There is a 12thc. N doorway and a plain font.
Parish church
Somerton is situated 20 miles due N of Oxford, standing high on the E bank of the Oxford canal in the valley of the river Cherwell. The original church is known to have been in existence soon after the Norman Conquest, and a N aisle was added in the early C13th. The present church is largely C14th and comprises a chancel, clerestoried nave, N aisle, S chapel and W tower. In the 16thc. the S aisle was converted into the Fermor Chapel, and new windows were inserted. The blocked arch of a Romanesque doorway is visible in the S exterior wall of the nave, also internally as a rere-arch.
Parish church
The church consists of a rebuilt 13thc chancel, a nave with a late Romanesque N door, a 14thc S aisle incorporating fragments of the late Romanesque arcade, and a late Romanesque W tower of four stages defined by double-chamfered string-courses. This tower was rebuilt in facsimile with much original material in 1906, including the simple round-headed windows and twin belfry openings. The foundations of the apsidal chancel were found in 1896 (VCH vi, 310).
Parish church
Long Wittenham is a village in the Thames valley, 3 miles N of Didcot. The church built c.1120 by Walter Giffard, 3rd Earl of Buckingham, consisted of an aisleless nave and a short chancel. A S aisle was added c.1200, running the entire length of the nave, with an arcade of four bays, and a N aisle of three bays was added to the eastern part of the nave c.1350. The piers of the two aisles do not correspond. The 12thc. chancel was extended eastwards to its present length in the 13thc., and a new E window fitted in the 14thc. The chancel was entirely rebuilt in 1850. A S transept was added c.1300, traditionally by Joan, widow of Gilbert de Clare (d1295), as a memorial chapel. It now functions as the vestry. A W tower was added in the 15thc. The chancel arch capitals are the only stone sculpture remaining from the original 12thc. church, although it is perhaps better known for its lead font - illustrated here but not described as it does not fall within the remit of this project.
Parish church
Hornton is in NE Oxfordshire, 3 miles NW of Banbury. The church was originally built in the late 12thc with ironstone rubble, and comprised a chancel, nave and a N aisle. It now has a largely 14thc exterior, resulting from the rebuilding and alterations of the next two centuries. The chancel was rebuilt twice in the 13thc and 14thc. The lengthening of the nave, the addition of a clerestorey, of a S aisle and a N chapel took place in the 14thc. The tower was added in the 15thc. The church went through a stage of chronic disrepair in the late 19thc and until 1916. Structural evidence of this is still visible on the S nave clerestory wall. The church interior is well known for its wall paintings, but it also has several remaining Romanesque features: corbels in the chancel, a transitional N nave arcade with round piers and scallop capitals, and a font with cable and intersecting arcading.