Milverton is a village about five miles W of Taunton. It is one of the largest villages in Somerset and has many fine buildings. Its name was perhaps taken from the old Town Mill to the north of the village. Milverton retains its medieval street pattern around the church which has central prominence. The church of St Michael has some 13thc work but is mainly later medieval, with a restoration in the mid 19thc. It is of red sandstone rubble with Ham stone dressings. It has an aisled nave with S porch and W tower, a chancel and vestry. There is a circular Romanesque font, and possibly some early masonry elsewhere, though no other sculpture.

F. Bligh Bond says (p. 83) ‘the foundation of this church goes back to the Norman Conquest. There was then a chaplain, and land was attached to the building.’ These facts are given in more detail in Fasti Ecclesiae Anglicanae, where it is recorded that Milverton was given to bishop Giso by queen Edith, perhaps in the latter half of 1065, and became a prebend. In DB the king held Milverton, and likewise many nearby settlements which had belonged to Earl Godwin and his sons. It had one of only seven recorded markets in Somerset.

Early masonry

The lower part of tower and wall adjoining to the E is suggested by Bond to be possibly Transitional work of the end of the 12thc. The narrow proportion of the tower and the disjunction with adjacent walls supporting an early date (1912, 83, 84). Pevsner also mentions this possibility (1958, 238). However, there is no sculpture present and so it does not form part of this report. Likewise, the church guide suggests a Norman date for the masonry at the base of the NW pier of the Lady Chapel, but there is only some rough masonry and again no sculpture.

Tower door

The fieldworker has drawn attention to the tower doorway as another possible candidate for inclusion. It has a plain chamfer with a basket arch, exactly what one would expect to find in a later medieval Somerset context. The tower itself with its diagonal buttresses and later medieval window tracery appears to be 15thc. There is no reason to believe that the doorway is any older than the tower, and so has not been included in this report, although a reference image has been retained with the general introductory site images at the top of this report.

Font

Bond (1912, 84) says that ‘the plinth of the old font is missing, but the bowl, which is late Norman, has been restored’. Pridham states that Buckler's drawing showed 'a square base with foot ornaments of cushion form meeting the angles; the whole standing upon a mighty circular base composed of blocks of stone'.