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St Nicholas, Great Doddington, Northamptonshire

Location
(52°16′27″N, 0°42′36″W)
Great Doddington
SP 881 648
pre-1974 traditional (England and Wales) Northamptonshire
now Northamptonshire
  • Ron Baxter

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Feature Sets
Description

St Nicholas' has an aisled nave with clerestoreys, chancel and W tower. The nave arcades, aisle windows (where original) and N and S doorways all date from the early 14thc. The S doorway is protected by a porch. The chancel is of a similar date, but the short and stocky three-storey tower is 12thc. in its lower parts, with a round-headed window in the W wall. The W doorway is a 13thc. insertion, and the diagonal buttresses are also later additions. The tower was re-pointed in 1685, according to an inscription on the S face. The saddleback roof described by Bridges was replaced in 1737. The present rooflines are owed to the restoration of 1871. The only piece of Romanesque sculpture is a scallop capital reset in the jamb of the S nave doorway.

History

Countess Judith held 4 hides in Great Doddington in 1086. No church or priest was recorded. Great Doddington formed part of the honour of Huntingdon in the 12thc., and Earl Simon de Senlis II gave the advowson of the church to his house of Cluniac nuns at Delapre, Northamptonshire c.1145-53. RCHME suggests that the tenurial shifts in the honour may have made their possession of the church insecure, and that this may be why they were not confirmed in their possession until the 14thc. A claim was made by Jedburgh Abbey, on the basis of a grant made when the honour was in Scots royal hands.

Benefice of Great Doddington and Wilby.

Features

Interior Features

Interior Decoration

Miscellaneous
Comments/Opinions

The nook-shaft capital suggests that there was a 12thc. doorway that was replaced when the aisles were added, and the stones used in their construction, but no other pieces have come to light.

Bibliography
RCHME Report, uncatalogued.
Victoria County History: Northamptonshire, IV (1937), 114-16.
J. Bridges, The History and Antiquities of Northamptonshire, Compiled from the manuscript collections of the late learned antiquary J.Bridges, Esq., by the Rev. Peter Whalley, Oxford, 1791, II, 140f.
N. Pevsner, The Buildings of England: Northamptonshire, Harmondsworth, 1961, rev. by B. Cherry, 1973, 232f.