Stanton Harcourt : St Michael

12th Century Norman origins, with 13th phase of building when Chancel replaced, transepts added and the crossing arches rebuilt in Early English gothic. Major 15th Century alterations to Church including final stage of the tower in Perpendicular style. Fine tomb chest and statues of members of the Harcourt family. The chancel built in the mid 13th is striking both for its size in relation to the nave and the amount of light admitted through the Early English lancet windows. The remains of the medieval shrine of St Edburg is situated in the Chancel.

About this church

There is documentary evidence of a Church in existence by 1135. That church had a spacious nave, a chancel and a central tower. The 13th Century phase created a large, spacious and well-lit interior.

The nave contains the only Norman (Romanesque) details visible inside the Church, consisting of the south door, through which one enters, the south door, two round-headed, deeply splayed windows in each of the side walls and a row of corbels in the form of grotesque heads high on those walls. As part of the Early English programme of works the east end of the neave was provided with a new arch into the crossing that was created at the base of the tower when transepts were added. An arched embrasure low in the north walls of the nave, at its eastenr end now frames a 15th Century window. A Perpendicular window at the west end was added in the late 13th Century.

The font is an early 19th Century restoration of a 15th Century original, of whose decoration fragments survive.

A staircase turret in the north east corner was added in 13th Century.

The Harcourt Chapel contains three tomb chests, two of which have recumbent medieval effigies.

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