Debden

St Mary the Virgin is truly stunning not least because you have no idea what to expect until you get out of your car! It is secluded from the village and reached via a narrow lane; surrounded by trees it is practically invisible until the last minute. The church dates from the 13th century with major, to my untrained eye, sympathetic, renovations in the 18th.

ST MARY THE VIRGIN AND ALL SAINTS. The interest of this church is connected with R. M. T. Chiswell who added the E chapel in 1793 and the Font in 1786. The church itself has C13 arcades of four bays with circular piers with moulded capitals and moulded arches. Only on the S side the two first capitals are enriched by upright leaves. The S aisle windows are Dec; C14 also the S porch. The W side has no tower but a front design which looks the idea of Gothic which the period about 1800 had. So it no doubt also belongs to Mr Chiswell’s time. To the same time the pinnacles must be attributed. For his E chapel Mr Chiswell got John Carter, the celebrated antiquary, to provide the design. It is an octagonal structure on the pattern of such a chapter house as York, connected with the church by a broad passage. The material is white brick, and all the detail of tracery outside (E window) and inside is of papery thinness. The chapel has a ribbed plaster vault, the passage timber arches with thin pendants. Inside the chapel is the elaborate MONUMENT of R. M. T. Chiswell  d. 1797, a tomb-chest with foiled decoration in the style of the C15 under a sumptuous arch in the style of c. 1300. Two other minor MONUMENTS in the current idiom of Late Georgian epitaphs are by King of Bath. - Large monument to William Burhill, d. 1703. It is signed Thorne (R. Gunnis). - FONT. 1789 3 octagonal of Coade stone in an elaborate and crisp Neo-Perp, with foiled panels; against the stem minute figures. The design was provided by R. Holland. Of Coade stone also the two medallions with quatrefoils outside the E chapel. - STAINED GLASS. In one S window heraldic glass evidently also late C18. The church stands all on its own in the beautifully landscaped grounds by the made lake. The Hall (by Holland, 1796) was demolished  1936.

Chiswell Arms

 Muilman Arms

Trench Arms

Exterior arms

Exterior arms

Exterior arms

Holland Memorial

Sadly the interior is a disappointment and doesn't live up to the, frankly, stunning exterior and wonderful setting - despite this I'm placing it as number two behind Saffron Walden and Thaxted as joint number one in North Essex.

And it has loads of snowdrops - which has to be good.

Arthur Mee:

DEBDEN. It is rich in old houses and farms, some Tudor and some 17th century. Scot's Farm at Hamperden End has in one of its rooms a lovely frieze with lions' faces. Mole Hall, its moat still wet, has three original chimneys, a fine barn, and two timber-framed outhouses with oak staircases. Amberden Hall, some way off, also has a moat; and New Amberden Hall, for all its name, is 17th century. The great house is Debden Hall, which stands by a lake in a splendid park of 200 acres; it was built in the 18th century, and is said to be the successor of one that stood here in the Con­queror's day.

The church of this beautiful village is in a perfect setting, reached through a field rich in Spanish chestnuts. It has seen many changes, the 18th century having given it a new chancel and bell-turret; but it has kept a 14th century doorway by which we come to a nave with 13th century arcades. One of the aisles is 15th century; the other, with its porch, is a hundred years older. There is a Tudor chest bound with iron, a window with the Chiswell arms, and an elaborate modern altar tomb to Trench Chiswell, who rebuilt the chancel after it had been destroyed by the falling of the old tower. A tablet tells of Harold Fisher, a Haileybury boy who helped to defend Ladysmith, won the DSO, and lived on to die for us in the Great War.

Simon K -

And then a good three miles up hill and down dale led me to Debden, which claims to be twinned with somewhere in Nepal. The village had a vaguely hippyish air, as if it was actually in east Suffolk, and on the main road a large professional sign pointed to the church and said OPEN EVERY DAY. You go down a long track into the grounds of the Hall (demolished in the 1930s) to the extraordinary sight of St Mary and All Saints

Open. If you go to Messing for a 17th Century chancel, you come here for an 18th Century one, but unlike Messing this is obvious from the exterior, too. Everything is spiked and glazed like a wedding cake.
You approach from the east, which is extraordinary enough. From the west, it looks like a public school chapel with an Essex tower bolted on. You step into a church with a relatively sane nave, it is the chancel which is bonkers. You go up half a dozen steps, and it is an octagonal space with long pendula hanging from the roof. Below the chancel is the mausoleum.

Quite how Simon Jenkins missed this but included neighbouring Radwinter is beyond me - maybe he got lost and went to the wrong place.

It was 5pm, and I could have returned to Newport at this point, but I had originally planned to do one more, some three miles to the north-east, and I decided the day would be spoilt if I didn't, so I raced through the increasingly flat roads to reach Wimbish.

Flickr set.

Clavering

SS Mary & Clement could, probably justifiably, be kept locked but I've always found it open - for which I'm truly thankful since this is a fascinating church with lots of interest.

ST MARY AND ST CLEMENT. A church of pebble-rubble, all Perp and all embattled. The W tower has angle buttresses, the aisles, clerestory and S porch three-light windows. Inside, the N and S arcades have curiously detailed tall, slim, lozenge-shaped piers. They have a thin demi-shaft on a semi-polygonal base and towards the (four-centred) arches semi-polygonal shafts. The roofs are all original  low-pitched and have a number of original head corbels. The nave-roof has tie-beams, the slightly earlier chancel has not. - FONT. Octagonal, of Purbeck marble, with two shallow blank pointed arches to each side, c. 1200. - PULPIT. Elizabethan, with two tiers of the typical short broad flatly ornamented arches. - BENCHES. Plain in the S aisle, with traceried ends in the N aisle. — SCREEN, with S broad, tall, one-light openings, cusped and crocketed ogee heads and panel tracery above. - STAINED GLASS. Much of the C15 in the N windows ; probably Norwich school. - MONUMENTS. Efligy of a Knight in chain-mail with coif and mail-coat reaching nearly to the knees. Purbeck marble, early C13. - Brass to one Songar and wife, c. 1480 (17-in. figures). - Brass of 1591 with kneeling figures. - Brass of 1593. - Margaret Barley d. 1653 and Mary Barley d.1658, both wives of the same man, almost identical, with frontal busts in oval niches between columns. Attributed by Mrs Esdaile to one of the Marshalls. - Haynes Barlee d. 1696, erected in 1747. Elegant frontal bust with decoration of a cool and classical style.
CLAVERING CASTLE. Remains of the site N of the church, near a handsome gabled C17 house called THE BURY. The site is rectangular with a ditch 75 ft wide and 18 ft deep. There probably have been stone buildings in the castle.

Arthur Mee:

CLAVERING. Scattered about a brook which feeds the River Stort it has, in a meadow by the churchyard, an acre of mounds with a dry moat round them, believed to have been the Roland's Castle in which Normans arriving before the Conqueror fortified themselves after incurring the anger of their Saxon hosts. On the hill is a windmill which has lost its sails.

The Grange, with brickwork between its timbers, stands in spacious grounds, and there are delightful overhanging cottages, one said to have been a 15th century almshouse. Next to it is a shop with carved Jacobean woodwork and wall-paintings of religious subjects. The clerestoried 14th century church has its original porch, and two fine arches in the tower and the chancel, supported by weird heads, are balanced by dignified nave arcades. The oldest possessions of the church are the 700-year-old bowl of the font and a stone figure of a knight in 13th century mail, lying in a recess. On a wall-tablet is Haynes Barlee, of grave features and curly hair, with his third wife, and to keep him company is a tablet in coloured marbles with a bust of his first wife, several children, and some skulls, and a bust of his second wife, "by whom he had a very plentiful fortune." There is another tablet in memory of the wife of William Wales, the gallant astronomer who sailed with Captain Cook and saw him die. He was one of that broken-hearted band who came home with the news a year later, and he settled down as mathematical master at Christ's Hospital. He took great interest in the condition of Society and was one of the first to conceive a census of the English people; but he found so much religious hostility to the idea that he gave up his researches. There are brass portraits of Thomas and Ursula Welbore and their six children in Elizabethan costume, and on another brass are three girls left motherless by Joan Smith in the 16th century.

The church is rich in treasures of 15th century glass, with scenes from the life of St Catherine, angels, Madonnas, the head of Christ crowned with golden thorns, and St Cecilia. All the roofs are 15th century, that of the chancel supported by finely sculptured heads, and a bishop and a company of grotesques sustaining the roof of the nave, which has fantastic bosses carved on its beams and seraphim watching from the sides. One roof has bosses of musicians playing, a priest in his robes, and an angel with an organ.

The high 15th century screen has panels of saints drawn in black lines on a white ground. There are over a score of medieval benches, two Tudor chests, and two 15th century chairs. But the masterpiece of craftsmanship here is the Jacobean oak pulpit, which, set on the stem of its medieval predecessor, is carved on each of its seven panels and has delicate inlay work of other woods.

Simon K -

Open. Clavering is a large, suburban village, big enough to have a supermarket. Celebrity chef Jamie Oliver grew up in the Cricketers, the village pub his parents kept.

Off of the high street is the old village centre, a winding lane with 15th and 16th century houses that ends at the churchyard.

A huge, perpendicular castellated church shoe-horned into a little churchyard, like a bullock in a ballet costume. The church would be quite at home in south-west Suffolk with its aisles and clerestory and great bulky tower.

Now, I hadn't really known what to expect, but this is a splendid church, full of interest of every kind. It has one of the largest collections of medieval glass anywhere in Essex, a fine rood screen, excellent 17th and 18th century memorials and much else besides.

I don't know how Simon Jenkins can have missed it. Let's face it, Essex is hardly over-burdened with the kind of spectacular churches you get in Suffolk and Norfolk, but this one is crying out for attention. It certainly went into my Essex top 10. A real find.
I took more photographs here than anywhere else, including Anstey.

Flickr set.

Chrishall

I ran out of time when I visited Chrishall - I had to get back for the youngest - I'll re-visit and do interiors. The south side of the churchyard has been more or less cleared of headstones and the north side is predominately modern. Fantastic battlements though.

I returned the other day, October 2010, and borrowed the key (after having to explain my reason to a deeply suspicious keyholder). For the de la Pole monument and brass alone it was worth the trip!

HOLY TRINITY. Quite a large church, on a hill, and on its own The material is pebble-rubble. C13 remains are the responds of the tower arch and of an arch at the E end of the N arcade. The rest is all Perp, the diagonal buttresses, and the flint and stone chequered battlements of the W tower (spire taken down in 1914), the battlements nearly all round the church (not N aisle) and most of the windows, and also the aisle arcades. These have an elongated semi-polygonal section without capitals and only towards the arches small semi-polygonal shafts with capitals. - FONT. Plain, of c. 1300. - PAINTING Large copy of Rubens’ Adoration of the Magi of 1624 at Antwerp. -  PLATE. Cup and Paten on foot of 1686. - MONUMENTS. Effigy of a Lady in a recess with depressed segmented arch and battlements; late C14. - Brass to Sir John de la Pole and wife, c. 1380. Figures, 5 ft tall, under a tripartite arch with thin side buttresses, an uncommonly important and satisfying piece. - Brass to a woman, c. 1450 (12 ins. long). - Brass to a man and wife, c. 1480 (18 ins. long; good).

Arthur Mee again:

CHRISHALL. It is charming with thatched and timbered cottages 300 years old, a gabled farmhouse of Shakespeare's day and a 15th century inn. It has, too, an ancient site that leaves us guessing, a mound surrounded by a moat still with water in it. Standing finely near a group of white cottages is the battlemented church, built by 15th century men who kept the thick Norman walls at the base of the tower, but made a fine new tower arch. On her tomb lies a stone lady with a perky dog at her feet; but the chief pride of the church must be in its brasses, one magnificent indeed. It shows John and Joan de la Pole of the 14th century, and, with its rich triple canopy, is one of the finest brasses in this country. John, wearing armour and a tunic, is hand in hand with Joan, who, with her pretty headdress and close-fitting gown, is a very captivating lady. At their feet are a dog and a smiling lion. Two other brasses show 15th century people, a lady with a high waist and a veil, and a man and his wife kneeling. For 600 years children have been baptised at this font; and there is a 16th century roof with Tudor roses over the north aisle, a fine modern kingpost roof in the chancel, pews with woodwork 400 years old, and lovely carvings of kneeling women.

Flickr set.

Chickney

St Mary was the first CCT church I encountered and immediately became my bell-weather church for Essex - a stunning location, lonely not to say isolated, a beautiful building and, in my experience, always kept open; simply put outstanding.

ST MARY. Saxon nave with two original double-splayed windows. Chancel with small E.E. lancets. The chancel arch is about a hundred years later. Its imposts are exceedingly curious; they are regarded by the Royal Commission as C19, but are not necessarily so. Pretty two-light squint to the l. of the arch. - FONT. C14 with buttressed stem and bowl with deep crocketed ogee arches with shields in the spandrels. - FONT COVER. C16, pyramidal, with embattled foot, and crockets, but certain leaf motifs which look Elizabethan. - PLATE. Small Cup with baluster stem, c. 1630-40.

Arthur Mee:

CHICKNEY. Here, its walls askew, stands one of the oldest and most remarkable churches in Essex. With a couple of farms and a cottage or two, it is all there is of Chickney.

The church stands in an oval churchyard - a shape loved by the Saxons - and is much as the Saxon builders left it. Here are their nave and chancel, the chancel having been lengthened in the 13th century and the little tower added a century later. Stirring it is to look at these walls and feel that they were here when the Conqueror set foot in Sussex. There are doubly splayed Saxon windows in the nave, with doorways of the 14th century; and in the chancel two Saxon windows keep company with two of the 13th century. On two of the windows on the south side are several old scratch dials. The kingpost roof of the nave is 600 years old, and so is the chancel arch, by which is a curiously shaped peephole through which the altar can be seen. The 19th century restorers came upon the altar stone set in the chancel by the 13th century men, and here it is in position again, with its five consecration crosses. A splendid font to which the babies have been coming for 500 years is carved with canopies and angels and shields.

Close by stands a 17th century house which has kept some of its old panelling; and about a mile away is Sibley's Farm, built in the 15th century, a gabled house with overhanging storeys. It has a Tudor staircase, Tudor fireplaces, a Tudor barn, and one of the oldest dovecots in Essex.

Flickr set.

Bush End

St John the Evangelist is a tiny church on the edge of Hatfield Forest. The church was built in 1860; is in the early English style; and consists of nave and chancel, with a tower. Despite being Victorian built I really liked it.

Neither Pevsner nor Mee recorded it.

Flickr set.

Broxted

The windmill that Arthur Mee refers to was demolished in 1953. St Mary the Virgin occupies an ancient Celtic site and the present 12th and 13th century building incorporates part of a Saxon structure. The whole church was heavily restored in 1876. St Mary's stain glass window project was completed in 1993; two new windows were designed and made to commemorate the captivity and release of the Beirut Hostages since John McCarthy was brought up in Broxted. The window of Captivity and the window of Freedom symbolise the hostage's ordeal.

ST MARY. C13 nave and chancel, and C15 N aisle and belfry. The belfry is weather boarded and stands on four posts two of which rest on corbels (alteration?). - The chancel has original lancet Windows, the nave no early features. The N arcade piers have an elongated semi-polygonal shaft without capital towards the nave and normal semi-polygonal shafts towards the arches, which are double-chamfered. w of the arcade in the C13 wall a tall ogee-headed niche with a small vault. In the nave S wall two early C16 brick windows. - PULPIT. With elaborate Elizabethan arabesque ornament.
CHURCH HALL. Exceedingly picturesque facade of four gables of different sizes and heights, late C16 with a mid C17 addition, grouped with the C17 brewhouse and barn.

Hostage window

Hostage window

William and Danny Mellen

BROXTED. With many fine trees and a windmill it stands out boldly a few miles from Thaxted. Its 13th century church has for companion a beautiful gabled house with one of its original Tudor chimneys, and standing by are two barns and a brew-house from the 17th century. There are Roman tiles in the walls of the church, which has a wooden belfry, a 14th century doorway, and a 15th century aisle. A canopied niche facing the door is the beautiful work of a craftsman 500 years ago, with pinnacles and buttresses, roses and flowers, and two angel figures. The church has two fine things from the 17th century: a processional cross with flowered ends and raised bosses, and an oak pulpit with much elaborate ornament. A quaint inscription to an 18th century man, Thomas Bush of Westminster, tells in stately language how he judiciously bequeathed his fortune among his relatives in such manner as to place them above the cares but below the dangerous indulgences of life.

Flickr set.

Birchanger

I was lucky when I visited as the church was locked, with no evidence of a keyholder, but a kind lady heard me trying the door and let me have a look around and take pictures. The exterior suffers from the loss of the tower (it also didn't help that it was overcast and mizzly) but the interior was interesting - the more so since it is normally inaccessible to the casual visitor!

St Mary the Virgin is one of the 250 Anglo-Saxon, or part Anglo-Saxon, churches that survive in Britain. It is built of flint rubble with dressings of limestone and clunch, and dates from the Saxo-Norman period (1000 to 1199). Birchanger may have had some kind of pre-conquest church but, due to re-building and alteration over the years what preceded St Mary is a matter for conjecture.

In the 1930's a 12th century south doorway was discovered, the internal arch was subsequently raised to accommodate the staircase to the organ gallery. Although similar in decoration to the west doorway it has additional foliage scrolls along the arch and a small carving high up in the tympanum depicting the Lamb of God, with cross flag of victory.

The interesting brass mentioned by Mee is to Lt Jack Southard Watney. He was killed in action at Tweefontein, in De Wet's attack on Christmas morning, 1901. He was the eldest son of Mrs Hattie Watney of 24 Clanricarde Gardens,and of Ernest Watney. He was born in March 1882, and educated at St Paul's School and at Eton. He volunteered for active service in South Africa, and first served in the ranks of the Imperial Yeomanry. He was quickly promoted sergeant, and appointed to the 11th Battalion in June 1901, as machine gun commander, with the rank of Lieutenant in the army. In the action in which he fell he was in command of a maxim gun, and reported by Lord Kitchener to have been killed "while heading a charge". He died with all the men of his gun section around him either killed or wounded. Lieutenant Watney was buried at Tweefontein, and his name was inscribed on an obelisk, which has been erected there in memory of all those who fell in this action. He was buried near the battlefield but his remains were moved to Harrismith cemetery in 1958/9.

ST MARY. Norman nave and E.E. chancel. A round tower was demolished at some time. The bellcote on the nave is C19. N aisle by Sir Arthur Blomfield 1898. The interesting thing about the church is the two Norman doorways, W (reset and no doubt originally N) and S. The S doorway was discovered only about 1930. The two doorways are similar in decoration, but there is, as usual, a little more emphasis on the S. Abaci decorated with chip-carved saltire crosses, tympana with frieze of saltire crosses at the foot. On the S side in addition foliage scrolls along the extrados of the arch and - a feature unique in Essex although quite common in many other counties - figure carving high up in the tympanum. It is a minimum of figure carving, a lamb, small and placed oddly at a slight angle. - BENCHES. Seven, plain, with buttresses; restored. - PLATE. Cup of 1567.

St Mary the Virgin

Aisle and Organ Gallery

Jack Southard Watney

Is this graffiti and if so, is it a camel, a five legged horse or an excited stallion?

Window detail

Arthur Mee:

BIRCHANGER. Very impressive are the trees at the great house, a splendid clump of eight elms in a field, a lovely larch in the churchyard, and a superb cedar of Lebanon, 18 feet round the trunk. Birchanger Place has also a dovecot with plaster nests still on its walls. The church has lost the old round tower which would have made it one of a select little company of seven in Essex; but it has kept its Norman nave with two doorways, each with a tympanum, one carved with a horse. The chancel is a century younger, with four small lancet windows. We come in through one of the Norman doorways to see a 15th century font, seven benches as old, and a modern brass, interesting as being one of the first pictures of a soldier's khaki uniform on a memorial. It is to Jack Watney, a lad of 19 who fell in South Africa in 1901, and shows a figure in khaki in front of a machine-gun. The gravestone of a rector tells a moving little story of Advent Sunday in 1877, Walter Hatch had taken as his text the words "Come ye, and let us walk in the light of the Lord"; and only a few minutes later "God took him."

Saffron Walden Reporter 03/01/19

Churches hit by raiders over Christmas period

IMOGEN BRADDICK

A church in Birchanger has launched an appeal to replace stolen items after the building was broken into twice in 10 days.
On the first occasion, on December 17, thieves smashed a window and stole more than £500 in cash and valuable church artefacts.

It is understood the suspects first made their way to St John’s Church in Stansted Mountfitchet and stole keys from a locked container before going onto St Mary’s Church, in Birchanger. No other items were stolen from St John’s Church.

Police believe the thieves may have been on bikes or mopeds and rode through Digby Wood on their way to Birchanger.

Elaine Wright, churchwarden for St Mary’s Church, said: “They broke into the benefice office in Stansted first and used keys they found to open our church and safe. About £852 in cash, a silver early 19th century chalice, flagon [jug] and a small communion set were taken to the value of £2,500. They broke a lead window as well - why they did this when they had keys we don’t know

“On December 27 we were alerted that the church had been broken into again. The other window to the Vestry was smashed and they prized open the wood in place of the other broken window to gain access.

“No money was taken or church items, but they did have a good sort through cupboards and caused a terrible mess. Prior to this happening they had broken into the Stansted office again. A description of a suspect is being dealt with by the police.”

The church believes the perpetrators planned the raid in advance using local knowledge because the thieves seemed to know where to find the money and that the cash was in a safe.

A spokesman for the church said: “We are devastated and saddened that this has happened, especially during the run up to Christmas, a time of peace and goodwill. Needless to say, the keys are now safely kept in a secure place off the premises.”

Flickr set.

Bardfield Saling

A very plain interior is more than offset by SS Peter & Paul being one of six round tower churches in Essex (the others being Broomfield, Great Leighs, Lamarsh, South Ockendon and Pentlow).

ST PETER AND ST PAUL. A C14 church with the chancel probably completed last. It was shortened in the C19. Round W tower whose windows look early C14. Early to mid C14 windows in the nave and chancel, but quite a marked difference in style between the S arcade and the chancel arch. The former has strong piers consisting of four main shafts and four keeled shafts in the diagonals, with moulded arches and head-stops, the chancel arch has late C14-looking responds. Big ogee squint. - PULPIT. Elizabethan, the usual arched panels treated in perspective. The pilasters between of termini shape. - SCREEN. Contemporary with the chancel, that is of large and relatively plain forms, ogee arches and, above in niches, quatrefoils coming down to an ogee point. Strong framing. - STRAW DECORATION for the altar made c. 1880, chiefly extremely naturalistic vine trails with grapes.
 

Arthur Mee:

BARDFIELD SALING. It has one of the six round towers in Essex, particularly interesting because it was built in the 14th century and is therefore a late example of such a tower. The rest of this small church is also 14th century, but the tiny chancel may­be a generation younger, perhaps because the Black Death fell on the land. There is attractive carving in wood and stone. Two gargoyles look down from the tower, the 15th century font is panelled on bowl and stem, and there is a 600-year-old screen of two bays. Particularly fine is the Jacobean pulpit, on which the old carver has very cleverly shown arches in perspective. Two elaborate panels, of the 17th century are in the modern pews. The organ was the gift of Sir George Elvey, whose church music is sung everywhere, for he was the composer of the well-known tune for Come, Ye Thankful People, Come.

Woolpits Farm not far away has kept a little home of the birds since the 17th century. It is a brick pigeon house, with a weather-vane swinging over a timber lantern on the roof, and clay nests still in the upper floor.

Flickr set. 

Simon K.

Ashdon

ALL SAINTS. Mostly C14, but externally much renewed. The W tower has a W window of early C14 type, angle buttresses, stepped battlements, and a spire. The S chancel chapel, which is taller than the chancel, has also two early C14 windows and is, besides, separated inside from the chancel by a two-bay arcade with an early C14 circular pier and moulded arches. To the same date the Royal Commission ascribes the kingpost roof of the chapel with four-way struts. The post itself is quatrefoil with moulded capital. Again early C14 one window in the S aisle. Later the arcades between nave and aisles which have a broad polygonal shaft without capital towards the nave and finer polygonal shafts with capitals towards the (two-centred) arches. The chancel arch is similar. C15 porches, and early C16 clerestory (a will of 1527 refers to three of the clerestory windows). - STAINED GLASS. Bits in the N chapel N window; c. 1400. - PLATE. Cup and Paten on foot of 1621. - MONUMENT. Big tomb-chest with three shields on intricately cusped panels; coat of arms on the back wall; early C16.

Arthur Mee says: Here by the Cambridgeshire border is one of the surprises of Essex, the Bartlow Hills. They are a group of mounds in two rows, the biggest being 40 feet high and 150 feet across. In them a century ago were found walled graves containing treasures of enamel and bronze and glass, the last resting places of British lords when England was part of the Roman Empire. We find a casket from these graves in the British Museum. Many old farms and cottages has Ashdon, some Elizabethan, some 17th century, and one, the old guildhall (now turned into cottages) built about 1500; it has an overhanging storey, ornamental brackets and the original timbers in the roof. The rectory is 100 years younger.

The oldest timbers in the village are in the 14th century church, where a lovely chancel roof was set up about the time of Agincourt. It has a beam with pierced ornament and other carving. Both porches are 15th century, and so are the chest and a moulded roof-beam. The nave has early Tudor woodwork and the big 14th century south chapel has its original timber roof resting on corbels of a lion and a knight. On a chapel wall at the windows are stone carvings of a knight and a woman, each behind a shield. The Norman font bowl is on a 13th century stem, the altar rails were made beautiful by Jacobean craftsmen and there are man fragments of glass about 500 years old, including an angel with golden wings. An altar tomb panelled with shields is in memory of the Tyrells of Henry the Eighth’s day and a tablet carved with fishes and scallop shells is to Richard Tyrell of 1566.

Flickr set.

Simon K.

Wealthy village near the Cambridgeshire border. My poor farmworker ancestors came from the parishes round here. What would they think if they could see it today?

The church is very well kept, in a lovely setting.