A HISTORY OF BUCKINGHAMSHIRE 



finialed hood-mould and small side buttresses orna- 

 mented with traceried panelling. The underside of 

 the head is carved to imitate rib-vaulting. There is 

 also a moulded 14th-century image bracket on the 

 east wall with two mail-clad heads supporting it. 



The nave arcades are of four bays, the piers being 

 composed of four half-round shafts with moulded 

 fillets between, and having circular moulded bases and 

 capitals similar to, but not identical with, those of the 

 tower piers. The arches are two-centred, and of two 

 orders, both of which, towards the nave, are moulded 

 with a deep hollow between two small square fillets, 

 and two wave-moulds, while towards the aisles the 

 mouldings are simplified to a wave-mould on each 

 order. The arches have also labels towards the nave 

 similar to that over the western tower arch, with 

 grotesque heads as drips at the east end, and grotesque 

 heads are inserted in the crowns of the western pair 

 of arches. The west door, also original, has a two- 

 centred head, both head and jambs being continuously 

 moulded with an elaborate section of wave-moulds, 

 hollows and fillets worked on a splayed face. There 

 is also an external label. The west window of the 

 nave is a 1 5th-century insertion with a deep hollow 

 moulded external reveal, a four-centred head and 

 label and four cinquefoiled lights with tracery above. 



The roof of the nave is modern, of low pitch, and 

 continued over the aisles, but the trace of the original 

 steep-pitched roof of the nave is clearly visible on the 

 west wall of the tower, and from this it is evident 

 that the north and south walls of the nave retain 

 their original height, while a change in the masonry 

 of the north aisle, visible where the external rough- 

 cast has fallen away, suggests that the aisles were 

 originally roofed at about half their present height, 

 the old nave roof running over them without a break. 



The north aisle contains two original three-light 

 windows, both with wave-moulded rear arches, and 

 internal and external labels. The western of these 

 two windows has, however, lost its original net tracery, 

 and now has clumsy mullions and transoms of late date. 



The north door between these windows is similar 

 in detail to the west door, but has been much de- 

 faced. Above the door and windows are three two- 

 light clearstory windows, insertions of late 15th-cen- 

 tury style with cinquefoiled lights under a flat head, 

 but probably dating from the I Jth century. 



The south aisle has two two-light windows, the 

 western one being similar to the corresponding win- 

 dow on the north, both as to the original opening and 

 the inserted tracery, while the second window is a 

 replica of the north and south windows of the chancel. 

 The original south door between these windows is 

 blocked, while the clearstory over them has three 

 two-light windows of I yth-century date, with rounded 

 uncusped heads, plainer than those in the north aisle, 

 as not being visible from the road. The north porch 

 is a comparatively recent addition of timber, lath, and 

 plaster. On the south wall of the chancel is a wall 

 monument to Samuel Bosse 'of Byrton,' the founder 

 of a local charity, and his wife Cecily, nine sons, and 

 four daughters. The circular font is rather plain, with 

 a cable moulding round the top, and of late 12th- 

 century date. 



There are six bells by Briant of Hertford, the 

 tenor of 1809, and the rest of 1816, and there is also 

 a small sanctus bell cast by Richard Chandler in 1678. 



The church plate consists of a chalice of 1693, a 

 standing paten of 1718, a flagon of 1729, bequeathed 

 by the Rev. John Sambee, vicar of Bierton, who died 

 in 1728, and an interesting small mediaeval paten 

 without marks of any kind bearing the vernicle within 

 a sunk quatrefoil. It has originally been parcel gilt, 

 but the gold is almost entirely worn away. 



The first book of the registers contains baptisms 

 and burials from 1560, and marriages from 1563, the 

 latter two classes of entry continuing to 1723, and 

 the burials to 1688, from which time they are con- 

 tinued in a separate book, containing notices of the 

 affidavits of burial in woollen, to 1809. A third 

 book contains baptisms and marriages from 1723 to 

 1757 and 1753 respectively, while a fourth book 

 contains baptisms from 1758 to 1809, and a fifth 

 baptisms and burials from 1810 to 1813, and there 

 is a printed book of marriages by banns from 1754 to 

 1812. 



The chapel of Bierton originally 

 ADVQWSQN belonged to the prebend of Ayles- 

 bury. In 1266 Richard, Bishop of 

 Lincoln, 169 with the consent of Master William de 

 Shirewode, rector of the prebendal church, granted 

 the chapel to the Dean and Chapter of Lincoln. The 

 reason of the grant is to be found in the poverty of 

 the cathedral chapter, while the prebend was said to 

 abound in temporalities. This grant was confirmed 

 in 1315 "' by Edward II. 



Besides the chapel of Bierton, the chapels of Buck- 

 land, 1 " Stoke Mandeville, and Quarrendon were at 

 the same time detached from the parent church of 

 Aylesbury and granted to the Dean and Chapter. The 

 grantees obtained the ordination of a vicarage for the 

 four chapels during the episcopate of Bishop Sutton "* 

 (1290-9). Bierton, however, seems always to have 

 been the principal church, the other three being ap- 

 pendant chapels. In 1535"* the benefice was called 

 ' Bierton with members,' and consisted of the church 

 at Bierton with the chapels of Broughton, of the value 

 of 20 a year, Buckland locv., Stoke Mandeville with 

 Stoke Hailing 10, Quarrendon 6 13*. 4</. There 

 were also tenements in Bierton worth 2O/., and a cot- 

 tage worth 4/. belonging to the benefice. 



In i636, 174 the church of Bierton was in a ruinous 

 condition, the steeple having fallen down. The repairs 

 were estimated to cost 200 marks, to the raising of 

 which the inhabitants of the hamlet of Quarrendon 

 should have contributed, since they did ' their Chris- 

 tian duties ' at the church of Bierton. The Dean and 

 Chapter of Lincoln 1/s have been patrons of the living 

 ever since the first grant in 1266. The presentations 

 of the vicar were made in the early part of the I gth 

 century to the ' vicarage of Bierton, with Buckland 

 and Stoke Mandeville,' 176 but they were separated in 

 l858, 1 " and Bierton now forms a separate benefice, in 

 the gift of the Dean and Chapter. 



There are two references to a chapel at Broughton, 

 but there are no traces of its existence at the present 

 day. Originally it was one of the two chapels appen- 

 dant to the church of Weston Turville, and is men- 



" Cal. tat. 1313-17, p. Si. 

 17 Ibid. 171 Ibid. 



W* Line. Epi. Reg. Inst. Sutton, foU 

 I ltd. 



17 Valor Eccl. (Rec. Com.), iv, 1 1 . 



l"< Cal. S.P. Dam. 1636-7, p. 65. 



1" Valor Eccl. (Rcc. Com.), iv, 1 1 ; 



326 



P.R.O. Inst. Bks. 1683, 1750, 1759. 

 1786. 



l? 6 Lipscomb, Hist, of Such, ii, 104. 



177 Cf. Mandeville and Buckland. 



