Round Tower - St Margaret - Ilketshall St Margaret, Suffolk - Romanesque Architecture on Waymarking.com

Romanesque round tower of St Margaret's church, Ilketshall St Margaret. Pevsner describes it as Norman (visit link) , although it is more likely pre-conquest Saxon, 900-1000AD.

"Ilketshall St. Margaret is one of 180 round tower churches in England, only six of which are outside East Anglia. It consists of a round west tower, nave, chancel and south porch. The roof is of slates, and the pitch of an earlier thatched roof can be seen against the tower.

The tower itself is a complete circle within, showing that it was built at the same time as the church - many of the round towers were built onto existing churches. Locally found flints are the main building material, with later brick buttresses at the east end. Some historians date it no earlier that the twelfth century, but one local round tower expert is convinced that the tower, up to the base of the belfry, and most of the church, are Saxon - probably just before 1000AD.

The overall shape of the church, tall, long and narrow, with a short, 35'-40' bell tower, points to the middle Saxon period, 900-1000AD. The church walls are less than 3’ thick which also favours the Saxons over the Normans who built wider churches, over 20', with thicker walls and taller bell towers. The flints are of all sizes, shapes and colours, set in large amounts of mortar, with little or no attempt at selecting and coursing, as seen in late Saxon/early Norman churches.

The south west corner of the church shows no signs of the dressed stone quoins which are a hallmark of the Norman period. It is built of large and cut flints with some large, rough blocks of stone - erratics. (There was no dressed stone in East Anglia until the Normans imported it mostly from Caen.) South of the tower is a quarter round fillet of flints which fixes the tower in the pre-conquest era. Both fillet and quoins on the north west side are covered by the stair turret. On the north and south sides of the tower. 10' from the ground, are two Saxon circular, double splayed, windows. The slit windows above are of a type favoured by Saxons as well as Normans.

Before the internal restoration of the early nineteen-eighties there were four Saxon belfry windows (inside the tower) below the present belfry - all round headed and built of flints The west window is still there but is much reduced in size and framed in dressed stone on the outside."

SOURCE - (visit link)

Web site proof of Romanesque or Pre-Romanesque features: [Web Link] Type of building (structure): Church Address: St Margaret Low Street Ilketshall St Margaret Suffolk England NR35 1QZ Date of origin: Not listed Architect(s) if known: Not listed Romanesque or Pre-Romanesque: Not listed

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