Aston Rowant is 5 miles S of Thame, in the far E of Oxfordshire, near the Buckinghamshire border and the edge of the Chilterns. The large church is of flint with stone dressings, comprising a chancel, nave with chapels on N and S sides, a S porch and a W tower. The N and S walls of the nave date from the 11thc. or early 12thc., when it was probably a two-cell structure. In the S wall of the nave there is a round-headed Romanesque window in its original position, just above and W of a 13thc. doorway. In the N wall of the N aisle is a similar window and a plain Romanesque doorway, both moved from their original position in 1874 when that part of the N nave wall was demolished. They are now in their equivalent positions in the new wall of the N aisle, and directly opposite the round-headed window and later S doorway.

Aston Rowant is thought to have been a royal estate. Its position as head of a deanery make it likely that there was an early church here, in existence at least by Domesday. At some time, probably in the early 12thc., it was given to Wallingford Priory by Maud, daughter of Robert d’Oilly of Oxford, who had founded it (VCH).