Church of St Bartholomew

Details

FINNINGHAM CHURCH LANE (SOUTH SIDE) TM 0669 7/2 Church of St. Bartholomew 29.7.55

GV I

Parish church. Early C14, south porch added and refenestrated in C15, north porch added in C16; restored and chancel largely rebuilt 1886. Flint rubble, part cement rendered, ashlar dressings; knapped and squared flint in south porch, irregularly bonded red brick north porch. Slate nave roof, plaintiled chancel roof. Long nave with narrower short chancel, west tower, south porch, north porch/vestry. 3 stage square west tower, unbuttressed with ashlar quoining, upper half rendered, moulded plinth. To west an entrance, a slightly ogee headed pointed arch with hollow and wave moulded orders, hood mould with square outer moulding, moulded double doors with a blocked 5-light head. Second stage has small chamfered louvred lancets, string course to belfry, 3 chamfered pointed arched Y traceried louvred openings with hood moulds, to east a quatrefoil, cornice to knapped flint embattled parapet, small brattished angle projections. Nave has three 3-light large Perpendicular windows to each side, trefoiled ogee headed lights, brattished rectilinear tracery, segmental pointed arched heads. Eaves boarded to south, C15 timbers exposed to north, diagonal buttresses to west with coped parapets into tower, straight buttresses to east with a scratch dial to south, coped gable parapet with C19 kneelers. South porch is to west of centre on nave, outer pointed arch, waved moulded outer order with restored Tudor flower and coronet ornament, inner Tudor flowers onto shafted responds with brattished caps, hood mould with mask stops; flint panelled double plinth, flint panels above have traceried stone heads, ashlar above a projecting course at impost level of arch, relief octafoils with shields of arms in spandrels of entrance arch, flanking statue niches with restored cusped ogee heads, pedestals, outer shafts to pinnacled and crocketed heads; above flint panels with cusped and pinnacled tracery, a central niche with lion at base, restored vaulting, richly crocketed ogee canopy with a brattished domical head, shafts with crocketed pinnacles; shallow gable to front, parapet has relief quatrefoils, moulded coping, broken shaft to ridge cross, angles have crocketed pinnacles; 2 stage brattished diagonal buttresses to returns with tall 2-light Perpendicular windows, brattished rectilinear tracery, hoodmoulds with foliate stops; C19 wrought iron doors into porch, inner entrance has a C14 pointed arch with a single moulded order, hoodmould, early moulded doors, inner jamb to east has carved consecration crosses. North porch has an outer hollow moulded 4 centred gauged brick entrance arch, hood mould continued as a string course onto diagonal buttresses and returns, over arch an empty panel with a moulded square head, steeply pitched pantiled roof; returns have moulded plinths, 2-light Y traceried hollow moulded openings with 4 centred arched heads, C14 inner entrance as to south. Unbuttressed chancel, to east a restored 3-light Perpendicular window as in nave, above a C19 niche ornamented as on porch, kneelers to coped gable parapet with ridge cross, to south a low side door in a chamfered pointed arch, flanking and to north similar 2-light Perpendicular windows. Interior: broad chancel arch with outer hollow moulding, inner continuous chamfer. To tower a 4-centred arched opening with pointed arched doors, above leading to belfry a chamfered pointed arched opening. 7 bay single hammerbeam nave roof, moulded posts with arched braces to hammerbeams from which terminal figures are removed, arched braces up to brattished collars, moulded principals and butt purlins, foliate bosses, coved and moulded wall plates with brattishing continued on hammerbeams, brattished moulding over rendered ashlaring. 4 bay chancel roof is C19 following nave model. North porch roof has arched braced collars, moulded wallplates. Chancel south wall restored piscina with a trefoiled head, lower sill to adjacent window as sedilia. Nave to west has early herringbone brick paving. Octagonal font at west end of nave, late C15 restored; complex double base has rebates in upper section to create a Maltese cross, heavily moulded stem with cusped pointed arched panels, roll moulded surrounds, coving to bowl with quatrefoil traceried panels, roses and masks, square patterning on alternate panels. Ornate C15 timber font cover, brattishing over moulded base, complex traceried panels with varying geometrical designs of squares and circles, crocketing up to low pinnacle, lifting system with ornate wrought iron weight. Poppyhead bench ends, some re-used as choir stalls, many of C15 with tracery; seated figures and grotesques on buttressed arm rests, possibly vices and virtues, a depiction of greed, a figure with a rosary, 2 figures in castles. Late C19 Gothic reredos, to west a late C19 Neo-Perpendicular gallery with traceried frontal. An C18 or C19 chest reusing older iron binding. On chancel north wall a marble tablet to Sir J. Fenn, 1794, antiquary, editor of the passion letters, by J. Bacon, 1797; lengthy inscription, above a female figure mourning over a chest tomb with shield of arms, black marble backing. Tablet to J. Williamson, d.1781, by J. Golden, white and pink marble, Neo- classical, at base a swagged frieze, guttae and a radiating lunette, above scrolls with shield of arms. Elenor Fenn, d.1813, by Thomson, inscribed pointed arched slab, ogee hoodmould with mask stops; Ann Frere, d.1728, long inscription in a marble suround; a brass plaque specifying charity of E. Frere of 1766. Chancel floor 3 C17 inscribed slabs. Nave floor 2 brass insets. East window has fragments of C15 glass, saints at head, C19 glass in chancel to north.

Listing NGR: TM0664969396

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