Details
TF 83 NE NORTH CREAKE CHURCH STREET (east)
5/38 Church of St. Mary.
5.6.53.
I
Parish Church. C.1300 chancel, south porch and south door, C15 nave and north
aisle west tower. Restored 1897. Knapped and rubble flint with stone dressings,
lead roofs. West tower, nave and north aisle, south porch, chancel. Tower,
perhaps 1503, ashlar plinth, knapped flint to west face only. 4 stages, with
set-off buttresses with ashlar quoins to 4 angles. 4 panel C15 west door
with tracery spandrels panels. Arch with traceried spandrels. Fine 4 light
west window with tracery head and drip mould. 2-light square head Perpendicular
window above. Bell chamber has 4 3-light Perpendicular tracery windows.
Battlemented parapet with flushwork tracery and shields. Inscription reported
on east side to Ralph Blondeville, 1503. 4 bay nave has 4 lower and 4 clere-
storey 3-light Perpendicular tracery windows unusual 2 storey south elevation
explained by addition of later C15 knapped flint clerestorey. 4 south
buttresses with set-offs and ashlar facings, same details as those of tower,
possibly 1503. Single C14 south porch with outer arch, north and south quatre-
foils, richer entrance arch without bases or capitals. Nave north side has
Perpendicular 2-light west window, 2 2-light straight headed north windows
3-light west window, perhaps C17. Perpendicular north door Decorated 4-bay
chancel associated with date of 1301 recorded in no longer extant east window
inscription to William Careltone : "construxit hunc cancellum Anno Domini
MCCCI". Chancel south side has 2 central 2 light "Y" tracery windows with
sub-cusped trefoiled lights and trefoil spandrel, 2 north and south
Perpendicular 3-light tracery windows. South priest's door and 2 set-off
buttresses. Roof heightened above line of c.1300 windows. East gable has 5
light window with 4 trefoils and central spandrel quatrefoil, tracery perhaps
of 1897 restoration. Paired set-off angle buttresses. Chancel north side has
one c.1300 central 2 light window with trefoil headed lights and trefoil
spandrel. One large south 3-light window c.1300 with 2 canted and one upright
trefoils in spandrel. C19 north vestry addition has reused C14 west window.
Interior: Perpendicular tower arch and 4 bay north arcade with octagonal piers
and with double hollow chamfered arches. Fine 5 bay Perpendicular single
hammerbeam double frame nave roof. Semi-octagonal moulded wall posts on corbels
with bases and capitals, arched wall plates, moulded brackets supporting
hammerbeams with liturgically vested angels with instruments. Hammerbeams
support pierced tracery spandrelbrackets above with moulded arched principals.
Outstretched winged angels at junctions with moulded purlins and bosses at
junction with ridge. At the wall plate a moulded coving section has lower
brattishing, 2 out-stretched winged angels to each half bay, upper painted
chevron moulding, traceried panel and crowning brattishing. Some colour
surviving. Circular stone font bowl, perhaps C12, elaborate painted and carved
font cover, 1897. Nave south east sepulchre and piscina. Nave and aisle outer
walls have C18 panelling with cornice. North aisle has Perpendicular arch
braced roof with central purlin and chamfered rafters. Royal Arms of Charles
I over north aisle north door. Fine traceried 7-light north aisle screen,
partly C15. North aisle altar 1978, incorporating 4 C14 painted panels of
Fortitude, Temperance, Mercy and Justice. Chancel arch Decorated or Perpen-
dicular. C15 rood stairs door at north-east in north aisle, and rood loft
door against chancel arch. Elaborate c.1897 Decorated' detail oak carved rood
screen, similar to altar and reredos by Hicks. Indistinct medieval Doom
painting above chancel arch. 4 bay chancel has arched braced hammerbeam roof
similar to nave, largely restored and repainted 1877. Fine but over-restored
south side sedilia and piscina, mid-C14, with corbels and painted diapering.
North side heavily restored c.1300 Easter Sepulchre. Cusped and sub-cusped
arch, gable with open work tracery, crockets and finial, outer buttresses
with finials. Chancel floor 1897.
Brass: a civilian, holding a church as donor, possibly Sir William Calthorpe
who claimed in his will (1495) to have rebuilt the church, giving a possible
date for the clerestorey and roofs. Elaborate carved and painted altar and
reredos, c.1897 by Hicks of Newcastle on Tyne. Church restored 1897 by
Frederick Preedy architect, as bequest of Bishop Lloyd, Rector 1894-1903.
See St. Mary the Virgin North Creake, (anon), (Fakenham) c.1980.
Listing NGR: TF8541037729
