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St Peter, Skerne, Yorkshire, East Riding

Location
(53°58′52″N, 0°24′23″W)
Skerne
TA 046 551
pre-1974 traditional (England and Wales) Yorkshire, East Riding
now East Riding of Yorkshire
medieval York
now York
formerly St Leonard
now St Peter
  • Rita Wood
23 May 2006

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Description

Extensive external rendering on this church makes it initially unprepossessing, but, as Pevsner said, the interior is a great surprise, with several surviving Romanesque elements. The church was restored in the 1840s.

The 12thc carved features are the chancel arch; reused voussoirs on the S doorway, and reset beakheads elsewhere. In addition, there are remains of simple splayed windows in the S wall of the nave – visible on the interior – and in the N wall of the chancel, and a plain blank arch, rather wide for a tower doorway, in the W wall of the nave, to the N of the tower arch.

History

The landholders at the time of Domesday Book were the king and Hugh son of Baldric (VCH II, 197, 277, 321). There are no papers relating to this church at the Borthwick Institute.

Features

Exterior Features

Doorways

Interior Features

Arches

Chancel arch/Apse arches

Interior Decoration

Miscellaneous
Comments/Opinions

Chancel arch, 1st order, capitals: the hanging volutes are comparable to capitals at Newbald on the E arch of the crossing, N side; a similar variation in depth occurs at Newbald, for example, on the S doorway, first order, L capital. A comparison for the male heads may be found on the chancel arch at Helmsley (YN).

A substantial amount of the chancel arch may be careful restoration or replacement of the original work.

S doorway: the beakheads have a profile like that at Kilnwick on the Wolds; the voussoirs would originally been in two orders, perhaps like Shiptonthorpe. (Fieldworker)

Bibliography

J. E. Morris, The East Riding of Yorkshire, London 1919, 289.

N. Pevsner and D. Neave, The Buildings of England: Yorkshire: York and the East Riding, New Haven and London 1995, 684.

Victoria County History, Yorkshire, vol. II, London 1974.