Great Munden is a small village in the East Hertfordshire district of the county, 6 Miles N of Ware. The village straggles along a minor road running W from the A10 at Puckeridge, with the church at its western edge. St Nicholas's has a 12thc. nave with a S aisle and a 14thc. timber-framed S porch. The lower chancel is also 12thc. in origin, while the 14thc. W tower has a Hertfordshire spike and a vestry added on its N side. Romanesque features are found in the nave and chancel: a blocked N doorway, chancel arch and a small lancet in the N chancel wall. No access has yet been possible, so the channcel arch is yet to be recorded.

In the time of King Edmund, Great Munden belonged to one Aethelgifu, who left it to Elfwold for life in her will. In the Confessor's reign is was held by Eddeva the Fair, and in 1086 it was held by Count Alan of Brittany. At that time it was assessed at 7 hides and half a virgate, of which 4 hides and 1 virgate were held in demesne. The overlordship remained thereafter in the hands of holders of the Honour of Richmond. The earliest sub-tenant known was Gerard de Furnivall, from whose family the alternative name of Munden Furnivall was taken.

The doorway, badly eroded as it is, can be confidently dated to the decades around 1100, on the grounds of the cushion capitals and the heavy roll in the arch. Only one side of the chancel arch survives, but its capitals tend to confirm the dating.