St Andrew’s occupies an elevated position in the picturesque village of Nether Wallop in W Hampshire, SW of Andover.

The building has 11thc Anglo-Saxon origins, and is thought to have comprised a single nave and chancel, with transepts (porticus) projecting to N and S. A N doorway was added in the early 12thc. More extensive alterations and additions were begun in the late 12thc, continuing into the early 13thc.

As it now stands, the building comprises a W tower, a nave with N and S aisles, a W chancel bay (sometimes referred to as ‘crossing’, despite agreement that there was never a tower or transept in this position), and a chancel. The W tower arch, N doorway, nave arcades and the arches of the W chancel bay all bear Romanesque or Transitional sculpture.

Before the Conquest the principal manor of Wallop was held by Countess Gueda or Gytha from Earl Godwin. It was granted to Amesbury Abbey by Henry II in 1177.

In 1086 Wallop was a relatively large settlement with 91 households, a church and a chapel. The church may have been dependent on the old minster at Mottisfont (Gem & Tudor-Craig 1981, 116). It was granted to York Minster by Henry I in 1133.

The W tower was rebuilt following collapse in 1704. Much of the N aisle was rebuilt in brick in 1752. The chancel had been extended to its existing length by 1845, when it was rebuilt in a neo-Norman style. At the same time the W gallery was removed to reveal the tower arch, the windows were reglazed, the nave was repewed and refloored, and a new font was installed. The ‘old broken’ font was ‘ingeniously hidden in one of the high pews under the gallery’ (Salisbury & Winchester Journal, 19 July 1845, 3).

The compound pier, pier 1, of the S nave arcade was completely rebuilt in 1978 (Gem & Tudor-Craig 1981, 119).

The N doorway is the oldest carved feature of the church. It must have been reset from the nave when the N aisle was added c.1200. The outer order jambs may have been chamfered at that time.

Bullen et al. suggest that the doorway could be late Saxon, comparing it with the chancel arch capitals at Stoughton in West Sussex. Stoughton, like Nether Wallop, was owned by Earl Godwin before the Conquest. The Stoughton capitals, however, are carved with volutes rather than cushions (and are dated c.1100 by CRSBI) so the analogy is unconvincing. It is more likely that the doorway was added to the Anglo-Saxon nave in the early 12thc.

The flint W tower is dated by inscription to 1704, but represents a rebuilding of an earlier tower that had collapsed. The trumpet-like fluting on the capitals of the tower arch suggests a date of c.1200-1210. Bullen et al. describe these capitals as ‘scalloped’ and follow Pevsner & Lloyd in suggesting that they were reused from elsewhere (Pevsner & Lloyd, 1967, 344; Bullen et al. 2010, 405). Certainly, a tower arch of this height would have been unlikely c.1200-1210. Pevsner & Lloyd suggested the capitals came from the lost chancel arch, but any chancel arch removed c.1200 must have been an earlier feature. A more simple explanation is that the arch was rebuilt on a larger scale, using salvaged capitals, following the collapse of 1704.

The N nave arcade is, essentially, Early English rather than Romanesque; the S arcade is Transitional. They are both included here due to the prevalence, in Hampshire, of late 12thc or early 13thc arcades with circular piers and capitals that often include scalloping or fluting in the repertoire, alongside simple mouldings. Both editions of The Buildings of England interpret the fluting on the capitals of the S arcade as ‘flat, broad, simple leaves’ (Pevsner & Lloyd 1967, 343; Bullen et al. 2010, 405). Damage to the W respond of the S arcade was doubtless caused by the tower collapse of 1704.

The nave arcades were built in two phases. The three W bays (bays 2-4) of the S arcade have features that differ from the E bay (bay 1) and from all four N arcade bays: unchamfered inner order arches, the presence of labels, fluted capitals, and simpler impost mouldings. This suggests that a three-bay S arcade was punched through the S nave wall while an earlier transverse wall was in situ at the E end of the nave, corresponding to the walling within pier 1. Shortly after this a three-bay N arcade was added, the transverse wall was removed, and both arcades (and aisles) were extended by one bay to the E.

The lost transverse wall was identified as a chancel arch by the VCH in 1911, an idea followed by Historic England and others. It was suggested that this was destroyed when the nave was extended and a new chancel was created further E. In other words, the W chancel bay was understood to be a new chancel of c.1200, with openings into chapels to N and S. Certainly, the W arch of the W chancel bay is of similar date to the nave arcades. Its fluted capitals are described by VCH as ‘concave scalloped capitals’ and by Bullen et al. as ‘scalloped’; the two motifs – scallops and flutes - are clearly related and often found together. The arches to N and S, opening into chapels, date from the early 13thc or later: the capitals – including one fluted capital – may be reused.

The VCH’s interpretation of the building was revised following the discovery, in 1971, of wall-paintings depicting flying angels (two complete and two partial) in the spandrels of the W arch of the W chancel bay. In 1981, following restoration, they were studied together with the fabric of the church and dated to the early 11thc (Gem & Tudor-Craig 1981). The authors of this study suggested that the lost transverse wall in the nave represented the W side of a Anglo-Saxon transept or porticus, rather than a chancel arch. The painting would therefore have adorned the W side of the E arch of the transept, flanking a very low and narrow chancel arch which would have lacked the usual visual impact of such a feature. This arch would have been replaced on a larger scale c.1200.

The E arch of the ‘crossing’ was not recorded because it appears to be entirely of 1845, with half-columns and capitals imitating the W arch.