St Cleer is a small village about two miles N of Liskeard named after St Clarus, his patron, who probably founded the church in the 8thc. The church lies to the S of the village and consists of a granite rubble with granite dressings structure of a chancel, an aisled nave, a S porch and a W tower. The original 12thc building was largely renovated between the end of the 13thc and the beginning of the 14thc. From the end of the 14thc the chancel and the nave were extensively altered, and during the 15thc the S aisle, the S porch and the tower were added to the structure. The church was restored at the end of the 19thc.

Romanesque sculpture is found on the N doorway and on the font located in the nave.

The village of St Cleer and the church, with its early dedication and famous holy well nearby, does not receive any mention in the Domesday Survey although its pre-Norman origins. The first documentation of the 'ecclesia e Sancto Claro' dates from 1212. In 1239 Ingebram de Bray, Lord of the manor of Roscraddock, in St Cleer, granted the church of St Clarus to the Knights Hospitallers, who held it until 1538.

The N doorway dates to the early 12thc. The font, of a type found mostly in the NE part of the county (E. Sedding's type V) can be dated between 1150 and 1180; its shaft resembles that of the font of Ladbroke (Warwickshire).