St Mary - Cottisford, Oxfordshire - Medieval Churches on Waymarking.com

"It has been suggested that parts of the Church of England parish church of Saint Mary the Virgin may be Saxon.It has proportions like those of a Saxon church: long and narrow, and taller than it is wide. The quoins at all four corners of the building are a puzzle. On the one hand they are a mixture of long flat slabs and tall narrow blocks, like Saxon quoins in many other buildings. On the other hand, the quoins are not laid in the strict long-and-short alternation diagnostic of Saxon work.

All the windows are certainly later work, but in the nave the windows in the west wall and in the western parts of the north and south walls are high up, in positions similar to where Saxon windows would have been positioned. Low down in the east wall is a blocked arch very roughly made of uneven stones. It is of such rough workmanship that it could be from any period, but if it were Saxon it would be the wall of a porticus.

Cottisford certainly had a parish church by 1081, when Hugh de Grandmesnil gave it, along with its tithe income and a hide of land, to the Benedictine Abbey of Saint-Evroul-sur-Ouche. In 1167 St. Evroul Abbey transferred its property, tithes and land at Cottisford to Bec Abbey, which by then owned the manor of Cottisford.

St. Mary's was rebuilt in the 13th century. It is a small building with only a nave, chancel and south porch. The porch is Early English Gothic and has a sundial. The east window of the chancel dates from about 1300. The Gothic Revival architect Charles Buckeridge restored the building in 1861 and the present font was added at the same time. There is no bell tower but there is a belfry in the apex of the roof. The church had two bells in the 16th century. These have not remained but the church now has two bells cast in 1710 and 1858 and a small 17th century sanctus bell. In the churchyard are the base and shaft of a mediaeval stone cross.

The author Flora Thompson (1876–1947) grew up in Juniper Hill and was a pupil at Cottisford School. She wrote the Lark Rise to Candleford trilogy of novels, in which she modelled the village of "Fordlow" on Cottisford."

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Building Materials: Stone

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Date Logged Log User Rating   04/26/2018 K8)rose visited it