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St Mary, Ampney St Mary, Gloucestershire

Location
(51°42′47″N, 1°53′34″W)
Ampney St Mary
SP 075 016
pre-1974 traditional (England and Wales) Gloucestershire
now Gloucestershire
medieval Worcester
now Gloucester
medieval St Mary
now St Mary
  • Jean and Garry Gardiner
  • John Wand
05 Jun 1998

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Description

This small church is now isolated from the present-day village of Ampney St Mary. Local lore states that the medieval village was burned down during an outbreak of the plague and that the settlement moved to the hamlet of Ashbrook. The church was unused from 1879 until 1913, when it was restored. The building is of rubble stone with quoins, a stone slate roof, and a bellcote at the E end of the nave. It has an early 12thc unaisled nave with 12thc N and 13thc S doorways, a 13thc chancel, and a S porch. Above the blocked N doorway is a Romanesque carved lintel. In the S wall of the chancel there is a 12thc (according to Verey, 88) carved stone slab, reused as the lintel of a 13thc doorway. The font is Romanesque with an unusual square lead drain.

History

In 1086 Regenbald held Ampney St Mary from the king; before the conquest it had been held by Godric. Its value both before and after the Conquest was 100s. In 1133 Henry I granted to the Augustinian abbey of Cirencester all the property formerly in the possession of Regenbald, which included the churches of Preston, Cheltenham, Driffield and Ampney St Mary (VCH, 80).

Features

Exterior Features

Doorways

Windows

Interior Features

Furnishings

Fonts

Comments/Opinions

The church is noted for its surviving fragments of wall paintings dating from the 12thc to the 15thc.

Bibliography

John Carter, The Ancient Architecture of England, Vol. I, London 1806, pl. XV.

F. W. B. Cripps et. al., 'Proceedings at the Spring Meeting at Down Ampney, Kempsford, Fairford, Ampney St Mary, and Ampney Crucis, 25 May 1925', Transactions of the Bristol and Gloucestershire Archaeological Society 47 (1925), 20-22.

H. Dryden, with observations by R. Allen, 'Door Frame at Ampney St Mary, co. Gloucester', Transactions of the Bristol and Gloucestershire Archaeological Association 16 (1891-92), 127-131.

Fryer, A. C., 'Gloucestershire Fonts Part 6', Transactions of the Bristol and Gloucestershire Archaeological Association 37 (1914), 107, 109, 125.

C. Hicks, Animals in Early Medieval Art, Edinburgh 1993, 251, 253.

Historic England Listed Building, English Heritage legacy id 1089958.

Charles E. Keyser, ‘Notes on the Churches of Ampney Crucis, Ampney St. Mary’s, and Ampney St. Peter’s’, Journal of the British Archaeological Association, n. s. 20 (1914), 1, 81, 83, fig.24.

M. Salter, The Old Parish Churches of Gloucestershire Malvern 2008 21

E. Tyrell-Green, Baptismal Fonts, London 1928, 80.

Victoria County History, Gloucestershire 2, 1907, 80.

D. Verey and A. Brooks, The Buildings of England, Gloucestershire I: the Cotswolds (3rd edition) London 1999 142-143

David Verey, The Buildings of England, Gloucestershire: The Cotswolds, 1970, 87-89.