A HISTORY OF BUCKINGHAMSHIRE 



l a year. Hugh de Messenden and Walter de 

 Derneford, his fellow-owners, paid nothing for suit. 9 ' 

 JFFRICK'S F4RM or Manor (Auffrykkes, xvi 

 cent.) was at an early date given to Godstow 

 Nunnery, for it appears to have belonged to that 

 house in 1 29 1, 98 and to have remained in its possession 

 until its dissolution. 99 In 1541 it was granted by 

 Henry VIII to Sybil Penn together with the manor 

 of Beamond, 100 and followed the same descent. 101 

 Affrick's Farm still exists. 



The church of ST. JOHN THE 

 CHURCH BAPTIST consists of a chancel 17 ft. by 

 1 2 ft. 10 in., a nave 366. 2 in. by 1 6 ft. 

 gin., a north chapel 25 ft. loin, by 12 ft. 8 in., a 

 north aisle 7 ft. 4 in. wide, a south aisle 1 2 ft. 7 in. 

 wide with a south porch, and a western tower 1 1 ft. 

 i in. square, all measurements being internal. It is 

 one of the oldest buildings in the district, the nave 

 and perhaps the chancel dating from the beginning of 

 the 1 2th century. In the second half of the 1 2th 

 century a south aisle was added, and late in the same 

 century a north aisle. About the same time clear- 

 story windows were inserted in the south wall and 



PLAN OF LITTLE 



Scale of feet' 



MISSENDEN CHURCH 



perhaps in the north. The chancel shows no features 

 earlier than the 1 3th century, but its plan and perhaps 

 its walls are of the same date as the nave walls ; it was 

 at any rate remodelled in the I3th century, while a 

 north chapel, probably much shorter from east to west 

 than at present, was added to it in the 1 4th century. 

 The tower is an addition of fairly late 15th-century 

 date, at which time the north aisle was reconstructed, 

 and in the i8th century the south aisle was re- 

 built. In modern times little has been done beyond 

 the most ordinary repairs, but whitewash and plaster 

 have been most liberally used, the latter covering even 

 the tooled stonework in several layers. For this 

 reason some points in the early history of the church 

 must remain uncertain ; the length of the old south 

 aisle, the number of clearstory windows, and the date 

 of the eastern bay of the south arcade can only be 

 decided by removing some at least of the accumulated 

 whitewash and plaster. 



The east window of the chancel is of three uncusped 

 lights with shafted jambs and rear arches supported 

 upon circular shafts with moulded bases and capitals, 

 all of late 1 3th-century detail, but the window has 

 been so much restored as to be of doubtful date. On 

 the north is the 14th-century opening to the chapel 

 with a two-centred arch of two chamfered orders, the 

 outer of which is continuous. In the middle of the 

 south wall is a lancet window with a rounded 

 rear arch and a wide splay, c. 1200, and on either 

 side are later lancets, that on the east having a 

 late 13th-century moulded rear arch, while that to 

 the west is a single trefoiled light set lower in the 

 wall than the others. Its head appears to be a late 

 insertion. The chancel arch is low, of a single plain 

 order, semicircular, with a rough square abacus, but 

 has been so much cut about and smothered in plaster and 

 whitewash that its original details are not to be seen. 

 The north arcade of the nave is of three unequal bays. 

 The eastern bay has a small round-headed arch with 

 no eastern respond, and evidently of very late date, 

 cut through the wall in the i8th or igth century. 

 The two remaining bays have plain round-headed 

 arches and hollow-chamfered abaci 

 with a deep upper member, showing 

 that they belong to the end of the 

 1 2th century. A section of the old 

 nave wall some 7 ft. long is left be- 

 tween the arches, and the angles of 

 the jambs are worked with small 

 shafts or bowtels surmounted by 

 small foliate capitals. The south 

 arcade is of two bays, the eastern 

 being considerably the wider, having 

 been enlarged at a late date, probably 

 when the south aisle was rebuilt in 

 the 1 8th century. The second bay 

 remains untouched and is similar to 

 the two bays on the north except 

 that the jambs are plain and the 

 abacus is of earlier type. Above this 

 arch is a blocked round-headed clear- 

 story window, the 15th-century wall 

 plate cutting through its head, and 

 to the west at a lower level is one 

 of the original windows of the early 

 1 2th-century nave, a plain round-headed opening, 

 now blocked and covered with plaster and whitewash. 

 At the east end of the south wall is a dormer window 

 to light the pulpit. Between the two arches, on the 

 south face of the wall, is a low and shallow recess, 

 whose nature is not apparent under the plaster and 

 whitewash. 



The north chapel has an 18th-century east win- 

 dow of three round-headed lights ; and a two-light 

 north window of 14th-century date with trefoiled 

 heads and a quatrefoil over, and a moulded rear 

 arch with an internal label. Beneath and to the 

 west is a mutilated tomb recess of the same date with 

 a low pointed arch. The arch from the chapel to 

 the north aisle is also of I4th century date, like that 

 to the chancel. 



The north aisle has three 15th-century windows of 

 two cinquefoiled lights under a square head, one in 

 the west and two in the north wall, and between the 



W Rot. Hund. (Rec. Com.), i, 20. 



98 Dugdale, Man. iv, 369. 



99 Ibid. 373 and 377. 



H" L. and P. Hen. Vlll, xvi, 718. 

 101 Ibid, xiii (2), 1257 n. ; Chan. Inq. 

 p.m. (Ser. 2), cxli, 47 ; ibid. (Ser. 2), 



358 



ccxlviii, 31 ; ibid. (Ser. 2), ccccxciv, 63 ; 

 Recov. R. Bucks. Trin. 2 Jas. II, rot. 72 ; 

 ibid. Trin. 10 Will. Ill, rot. 94. 



