A HISTORY OF NORTHAMPTONSHIRE 



century style. Below the sills is a moulded string which 

 is made to range with that on the east wall, but has a 

 different section. The vestry at the south-east angle 

 is a small vaulted building, ashlarfaced externally, with 

 trefoiled lancets on east, south, and west, and has a 

 squareheadcd doorway to the church, but no other 

 entrance. The three sedilia are immediately west of 

 the vestry door, and have trefoiled arches with soffit 

 cusps under crocketed gables with tall finials, flanked 

 by buttresses once surmounted by pinnacles. West of 

 the sedilia, and between the windows, is a square 

 locker. West of the second window, and below the 

 string, is a blocked low side window, squareheadcd 

 within and without, with a flat sill and splayed jambs. 

 It is close to the south-west angle, and adjoining 

 it in the west wall is a square recess. 



The north or Lady chapel is two steps below the 

 chancel, and to the east of the arch by which it is 

 entered from the chancel is the half-round respond of 

 a late 13th-century arch, with a half-octagonal capital, 

 and a base buried in the pavement, showing that the 

 floor level was at one time still lower than at present. 

 The respond must have taken an arch springing north- 

 wards, which was destroyed with the rest of the earlier 

 north chapel when the present building was erected. 

 The east window of the north chapel is of four trefoiled 

 lights with a transom and tracery, and on the north 

 are two three-light windows of similar design, having 

 external labels with masks,' a late instance of the sur- 

 vival of a detail common in the neighbourhood. At 

 the north-west angle of the chapel is a modern door- 

 way, and at the west a wide arch of two orders, with 

 feathered cusps and shafted jambs, of the date of the 

 rebuilding of the chapel. 



The chancel arch, central with the nave, and before 

 the rebuilding of its south wall with the chancel also, 

 is plain work of the 1 3th century. It has been stilted 

 some 6 ft. at the springing in the 15th century, at the 

 time of the insertion of a roodloft, and the old arch 

 reset at the higher level. 



The nave has north and south arcades of two bays ; 

 that on the north, c. 1 1 25, has heavy scalloped 

 capitals with round pillars and responds, and moulded 

 semi-circular arches of two orders ; the crown of the 

 western arch has been rebuilt. The south arcade has 

 scalloped capitals with recessed angles and more finely 

 cut details ; the arches are semi-circular, having in the 

 outer order a line of large nailhead ornament. Over 

 each arcade, but visible only from the aisles, are four 

 narrow clearstory windows, spaced symmetrically with 

 the arcades, with a string below their sills intended to 

 act as a weathering to an aisle roof. The details of 

 the clearstory are the same on both sides, and it was 

 probably added at the time of the building of the south 

 arcade. The west window on the south side has been 

 destroyed. Above these windows is the present clear- 

 story, having on each side three 15th-century windows 

 of two cinquefoiled lights with a quatrefoil in the head. 



In the north wall of the north aisle are two square- 

 headed 14th-century windows of three trefoiled lights 

 with soffit cusps and moulded rear-arches. The west 

 window of this aisle has modern net tracery. The 

 north doorway is of the 1 4th century, of two moulded 

 orders with a label, and a segmental rear-arch. 



The south aisle has a two-light east window of early 

 14th-century style, the tracery being entirely new, as 

 are the two two-light windows in the south wall. The 



south doorway has a panelled arch, c. 1500, retaining 

 its old door, and quite out of centre with the south 

 porch, opening to its north-west corner. The porch 

 is large, with a plain pointed outer arch with cham- 

 fered angles, difficult to date from the absence of 

 detail, but perhaps contemporary with the aisle. 



The west end of the aisle overlaps the tower 

 and serves as a vestry, having formerly been a 

 schoolhouse. It is lighted by two two-light windows 

 with modern tracery. The tower is of three stages, 

 the two lower belonging to the beginning of the 12th 

 century. The tower arch has been replaced by a 

 pointed arch of two chamfered orders, probably of 

 the I 3th century, but the original half-round responds 

 remain, flanked by nook-shafts and having capitals 

 with volutes and early foliage. The tower is ashlar- 

 faced, with, on the ground stage, three narrow pilaster 

 buttresses on the north and south sides, and two on 

 the west. Half way up this stage is a chamfered 

 string with two rows of lozenge ornament. The 

 buttresses stop about 2 ft. below the string at the base 

 of the second stage, which is square in section with 

 shallow billets cut on it, and projects 6 in. from the 

 wall, having below it a row of corbels. The second 

 stage is more elaborately treated on the north, east, and 

 west, the sides visible from the main road, than on 

 the south. On the south there is a two-light opening 

 in the middle with a round-arched head between 

 two blank arcades with shafts and plain chamfered 

 labels, while on the other sides are a pair of blank 

 arcades on either side of the central two-light opening 

 with moulded arches and lozenge ornament on the 

 labels. This stage of the tower has also a wall arcade 

 in the interior. The belfry stage is an addition of 

 the 1 5th century, with windows of two trefoiled 

 lights with a quatrefoil in the head on each face. It 

 has an embattled parapet and flat lead roof, and 

 below the parapet a reused cornice of 1 3th-centur}' date 

 with large dogtooth ornament. In the 15th century 

 the north-west angle of the tower was rebuilt, with a 

 vice entered from within the tower by a doorway 

 with a crocketed ogee head. The west window of 

 the ground stage is also of this date, and has three wide 

 cinquefoiled lights with a transom and tracery in the 

 head. 



Except for a few old poppyhead benches under the 

 tower, and one in the north chapel, none of the wood 

 fittings are ancient. The roof of the north chapel 

 has plain heavy timbers, and all the other roofs are 

 modern, except that of the nave, which has moulded 

 tiebeams and intermediates, with braces to the tic- 

 beams, and is doubtless contemporary with the clear- 

 story. There are remains of vices leading to the 

 roodloft," and apparently to the roof also, at both the 

 eastern angles of the nave ; and on the south side, at 

 the level of the loft and just west of the doorway 

 which opened to it, is a trefoiled piscina in the wall 

 proving the former existence of an altar in the rood- 

 loft. 



Besides the sedilia, etc., already noticed in the 

 chancel, there is a cinquefoiled piscina in the north 

 chapel, and a trefoiled piscina (reworked) in the south 

 aisle with a wide segmental-arched recess to the west 

 of it open down to the floor level. At the east end 

 of the north aisle is a 14th-century bracket, and 

 another at the north-east angle of the south aisle, and 

 in the north wall of the chancel an ogee arch with 



1 For a still later iastance, see Peakirk. 



^ For an account of the rood screen, see Bridges, Hiit. of NortbantSj ii, 523. 

 506 



