Remains of All Saints Church, 60m north-west of Stanway Hall Farm

Summary

The buried and standing remains of All Saints Church, built in the 13th century and enlarged in the 15th century. The church was later converted into a private chapel in the 17th century.

Reasons for Designation

The remains of All Saints Church, 60m north-west of Stanway Hall Farm, Colchester are scheduled for the following principal reasons:

* Survival: for the standing, buried and earthwork remains which depict the form, plan and architectural detail of the church;

* Potential: for the stratified deposits which retain considerable potential to increase our understanding of the physical characteristics of the building. Buried artefacts and sediments will also have the potential to increase our knowledge of how the church functioned within the medieval and Early Modern periods;

* Documentation: for the historical documentation dating from the C13, around the time the church was built.

History

A parish church is a building, usually of roughly rectangular outline and containing a range of furnishings and fittings appropriate to its use for Christian worship by a secular community, whose members gather in it on Sundays and on the occasion of religious festivals. Children are initiated into the Christian religion at the church's font and the dead are buried in its churchyard. Parish churches were designed for congregational worship and are generally divided into two main parts: the nave, which provides accommodation for the laity, and the chancel, which is the main domain of the priest and contains the principal altar. Either or both parts are sometimes provided with aisles, giving additional accommodation or spaces for additional altars.

Most parish churches also possess towers, generally at the west end, but central towers at the crossing of nave and chancel are not uncommon and some churches have a free-standing or irregularly sited tower. Many parish churches also possess transepts at the crossing of chancel and nave, and south or north porches are also common. The main periods of parish church foundation were in the C10 to C11 and C19. Most medieval churches were rebuilt and modified on a number of occasions and hence the visible fabric of the church will be of several different dates, with in some cases little fabric of the first church being still easily visible.

Parish churches are found throughout England. Their distribution reflects the density of population at the time they were founded. In regions of dispersed settlement parishes were often large and churches less numerous. The densest clusters of parish churches were found in thriving medieval towns. A survey of 1625 reported the existence of nearly 9000 parish churches in England. New churches built in the C18, C19 and C20 increased numbers to around 18,000 of which 17,000 remain in ecclesiastical use. Parish churches have always been major features of the landscape and a major focus of life for their parishioners. They provide important insights into medieval and later population levels or economic cycles, religious activity, artistic endeavour and technical achievement. A significant number of surviving examples are identified to be nationally important.

The former All Saints Church, listed at Grade II*, was built in the C13 as the parish church of Great Stanway. The manor of Stanway is listed in the Domesday Book, and its name is formed from two Anglo-Saxon words – stan, meaning stone and weg or waeg, meaning way, the name originating from the proximity of two Roman roads to the parish. The church may have originated during this period under the auspices of the adjacent hall. If so, the archaeological remains of this earlier Anglo-Saxon church can be expected to survive as buried features. The surviving above-ground fabric of All Saints Church graphically illustrates its development from a C13 simple two-celled structure comprising a nave and a chancel, into a fairly large C15 parish church, and then its conversion into a smaller private chapel of the Stanway Hall estate in the early C17.

Documentary references from the C13 include a church valuation of 1254 and a reference to the parish church at Great Stanway dated 1291. During the latter part of the C14 the nave collapsed and was rebuilt. In the C15 the church was enlarged with the construction of the west tower, the addition of the north aisle and the insertion of a three-bay arcade. The chancel and north aisle were demolished around 1605 by Sir John Swinterton when the church became the chapel to Great Stanway Hall. In 1633 the church was visited by ‘Symonds’ who mentions the ‘ancient gravestones in the church of Belhaus and his wife’ (the Belhaus family were thought to have constructed the church).  No further structural activity of note appears to have taken place, other than blocking and repair, after the church became disused in the late C17 or early C18. By the early C18, the building was said to be utterly decayed and all the material of the roofs has subsequently been lost.

Further elements of the C12 to C15 church no longer visible above ground will survive below ground, in particular the foundations of the C13 nave and the C15 north aisle that was demolished in the C17. Underneath the present church there may lie the remains of an earlier foundation. The ground beneath the church and immediately alongside is also likely to contain burials related to both the parochial and later private use of the building.

Details

The remains of All Saints Church.

PRINCIPAL ELEMENTS

The monument includes the buried and standing remains of All Saints Church, which lies some 2.5km south of the village of Stanway.

DESCRIPTION

The early church, dating to the C13, was a simple two celled-church comprising a nave and a chancel. The C13 walling is of coursed sub-rectangular Kentish ragstone blocks, flint rubble and significant amounts of reused Roman tile and brick. The remains of these walls survive in the nave, to a height of 3m to 3.6m externally and 2.3m to 3.3m internally, and the buttresses of the south nave wall are contemporary with this period. During the latter part of the C14 the nave collapsed and was rebuilt. This new work can be seen in the south, east and west walls of the nave - the upper courses of medieval peg-tile being particularly characteristic of this period. In the C15 the church was enlarged with the construction of the west tower, the addition of the north aisle and the insertion of a three-bay arcade. The mainly brick built tower survives largely intact.

The conversion of the church into a private chapel in the C17 is evidenced by the blocked arcade (with the north nave door constructed through) and chancel arch, and the brick-built north porch. The chancel and north aisle were demolished at this time. A large sectional cast-iron water tank was inserted into the bell chamber of the tower sometime during the C20.

EXCLUSIONS

The water tank, all modern fence lines and paths around the church, telegraph poles and lines and a modern shed on the south side of the nave are excluded from the scheduling; however, the ground beneath all these features is included in the scheduling.

Legacy

The contents of this record have been generated from a legacy data system.

Legacy System number:

32437

Legacy System:

RSM

Sources

Books and journals
Pevsner, N, Bettley, J, The Buildings of England: Essex, (2021)

Other
Buckler, G, Twenty-Two of the Churches of Essex Architecturally Described (1856)
Morant, P, History and Antiquities of the County of Essex: Volume II (1768)
Royal Commission on the Historical Monuments of England, An Inventory of the Historical Monuments in Essex (1922)
Rodwell, WJ, 'CBA Research Report No.19' in Historic Churches a wasting asset (1977), p.118-119
Building Recording, Garwood, A, All Saints Church, Gt. Stanway, Colchester, Essex (1998)
Colour prints, Tyler, S, MPP Films 19 and 20 (2000)

End of official list entry

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