Stogursey is situated 3 mi from Nether Stowey and 8 mi W of Bridgwater, Somerset. Known in the 11thc as Stoche, it gained the suffix Curci from its 12thc ownwers; ‘Stogursey’ is the anglcised form of ‘Stoke Courcy’. Stogursey village lies at the junction of two ancient routes, one between the Quantocks and the coast, the other from the river crossing at Combwich. E of the junction and beside a brook, a church is known to have existed by the early 12thc. Upstream, S of the junction, Stogursey castle was built by 1204, and probably by 1166 in succession to a building of the early 12thc. A marketplace was established at the convergence of the two routes, perhaps in the 12thc, and a borough had been created by 1225.
The church, which is about 30m above OD, is built of random rubble with ashlar dressings and has a chancel with N vestry, a presbytery with N and S aisles, a crossing tower with N and S transepts, and a nave with a former N porch now used as a store. The tower, which is capped by a spire, and the transepts survive from the late 11thc. The E end was reconstructed in the late 12thc when the chancel was lengthened to form a presbytery and the transepts were extended eastwards. Initially a parish church, the church was given to Lonlay Abbey, Orne, France between 1100 and 1107 and a Benedictine alien priory was established shortly thereafter; the eastern extension of the building was to accommodate the monks. The priory was dissolved c1440, when the building again became a parish church. Norton (1866) gives a plan of the church.