Creslow is in the centre of the county, 5 miles N of Aylesbury. It consists only of the manor, now surrounded by farm buildings, one of which was once the parish church. This settlement is at the end of a lane off the Aylesbury to Buckingham road, near Whitchurch. It stands on high ground surrounded by the rich, rolling Creslow Pastures, which fed cattle for the court of Elizabeth I . Finds of coins and other objects in the area indicate continuous occupation from the Neolithic period to the present day.

There is no longer a village here, although the topography of the ground around the manor house indicates the site of the lost medieval village. Creslow manor house dates substantially from the 1330s, according to RCHME, but was almost entirely remodelled in the mid-17thc and again in the 19thc. The nave of the former parish church, dating in part from the 12thc, stands to the NW of the manor house, and is now given to agricultural use. It ceased to function as a church in the 16thc (the last rector was presented in 1554) as the population dwindled, and by 1786 it was used as a dovecot. By 1925 it was a coach-house, and it retains a coach-house doorway in the S wall. At some stage the chancel was removed, and houses were built against the E wall of the nave. The chapel itself is of roughly-squared limestone blocks, and in the N wall is a blocked 12thc doorway, originally round-headed but remodelled with a pointed arch. There are blocked two-light 15thc windows, one on the N side and two on the S, and brick repairs and a brick buttress have been added to the N wall. The only Romanesque sculpture is on the N doorway.

Creslow was held in 1086 by Ranulf from Edward of Salisbury, Sheriff of Wiltshire. Before the Conquest it had been held by Wulwene. The tenancy in chief was held by the Earls of Salisbury, Edward’s descendants, until the attainder of Thomas, Earl of Lancaster, husband of Alice the heir, in 1322. It then passed to the crown. Meanwhile the subtenancy was held by Robert de Hogshaw in the mid-13thc. By 1276 it had passed to John de Tedmarsh, and it remained with the Tedmarshes until 1312 when it was left to John de Stretley. It remained with this family until the late 15thc. The church and its advowson were in the possession of the Knights Hospitallers’ Commandery of Hogshaw from its foundation, probably in the reign of Henry II, until the Dissolution.

Any date between 1140 and 1180 is possible for this work, although the double-chamfered label suggests the second half of this range.