Around Bicester

Churches

Church of the Immaculate Conception (RC), The Causeway

The Roman Catholic Church of the Immaculate Conception was built in 1961-3, of brick. The main entrance looks out on The Causeway, the doors reached by a flight of shallow curving steps. The bronze statue of the Immaculate Conception above the door dates from 1993, and is by the sculptor Mark Delf. At the east end of the building, invisible from this side, there is a tower with pyramidal roof. The church website provides a short parish history with some further details of the building, including an illustration of a new crucifix, painted by the Prior of Farnborough Abbey, installed in 1999.

© John Ward

St Edburg’s Church (CoE), Church Street

This is a handsome town church, apparently Norman (or even earlier) in origin.  The north and south aisles date from the thirteenth and fourteenth century, and the pinnacled west tower is from the 1400s—apparently a replacement for the earlier central tower of what was a cruciform church.

Inside, it is spacious, with a tall wide chancel arch (once part of the central crossing), and tall piers running down the nave. On the north side, you can see a range of arches indicating the different stages of the building, with the round arch of the earlier crossing to the east, and the later pointed arch on the west. Between them, the triangular head of the lower opening may be the survival of a yet earlier stage: the Anglo-Saxon entrance to a porticus, or cell opening out of the main part of a church. The picture also shows the square solidity of the piers; with the south aisle, these were later cut down into a slender clustered form.

As a town church that has been rebuilt and extended, St Edburg’s has some furnishings from an earlier period than what we now have.  A fragment from a tomb-chest, showing carved figures of knights, is set high on the south wall of the nave. According to the church leaflet, these are thought to have come from Bicester Priory after its dissolution in the 1530s.  And the tapering sixteen-sided font (which BoE calls ‘extraordinary’) may perhaps be from the thirteenth century. It’s worth noting too that the Priory originally housed the shrine of the Saxon princess, St Edburg, now in St Michael’s Church, Stanton Harcourt. At the Dissolution it was removed (or rescued) from Bicester by Sir Robert Harcourt, then Sheriff of Oxfordshire, and taken to St Michael’s.

There are also some eye-catching memorials from a later age. Thomas Grantham (d. 1718), a commander in the Merchant Navy, is represented by a portrait medallion flanked by two cherubs and surmounting a winged skull, while Edward and Cassandra Turner (d. 1766 and 1770 respectively) are also shown with a (double) portrait medallion in three-quarter profile embellishing what BoE describes as a ‘pretentious, rather bulbous standing monument. And from a hundred years later, the east window in the south transept has a fine Morris & Co. window, designed by Burne-Jones, depicting Faith, Hope and Charity.

Emmanuel Church (CoE), Barberry Place, Bure Park

This brick-built church in Bure Park, about a mile from the town centre, is one of a small number of twenty-first-century churches to be met with on these walks. The main entrance faces inwards to a square, but its name ‘Emmanuel’ with the banner proclaiming ‘God with us’ catches the eye from the road.

Bicester Methodist Church, Sheep Street

© John Ward

Bicester Methodist Church dates from 1927, and was preceded by an earlier Wesleyan Chapel of 1841 (in North Street, now the Masonic Hall), and a United Free Methodist Chapel (now a shop) of 1863 on the other side of Sheep Street. The current church is an impressive brick-built erection with stone facings. The wide frontage has two bow windows (BoE calls them ‘domestic looking’), with three tall lancet windows in the upper storey. Inside there are apparently stained-glass windows dating from the turn of the millennium.

By Elizabeth Knowles

About the Author

Elizabeth Knowles is a renowned library researcher and historical lexicographer who devoted three decades of her career to Oxford University Press. Her time at OUP began with contributions to the OED Supplement and the New Shorter Oxford English Dictionary. Subsequently, she spearheaded the Quotations publishing program, solidifying her reputation as a leading expert in quotations and lexicography.

In 1999, Knowles assumed the prestigious role of Editor of the Oxford Dictionary of Quotations, a position she held continuously until her retirement from OUP in 2007. Under her editorial guidance, the eighth edition was published in 2014, marking a significant milestone in the dictionary’s history.

Knowles is a prolific writer and lecturer on the history of quotations and dictionaries. She has shared her extensive knowledge with both academic and general audiences, significantly enhancing our understanding of the role of quotations in language.

Beyond her work on the Oxford Dictionary of Quotations, Knowles is also the editor of “What They Didn’t Say: A Book of Misquotations” (2006) and “How To Read a Word” (2010). Her work continues to inspire and inform scholars, writers, and readers fascinated by the English language.