A HISTORY OF LANCASHIRE 



accompanied with ornament of distinct Renaissance 

 type, and it is extremely doubtful if this can be of so 

 early a date as the first decade of the sixteenth cen- 

 tury. A displayed eagle also occurs on the stalls, 

 perhaps in reference to the arms of Cotton, to which 

 family Anthony's mother belonged. 1 



The present east window of the chancel is filled 

 with modern tracery, inserted about 1870, and re- 

 placing a tracery window of five lights with three 

 transoms, all openings being without cusps, and the 

 heads under the transoms rounded. The side win- 

 dows are still of this type, as are those lighting the 

 south chapel and aisle, and would fit very well to the 

 probable date 1535-40. East of the chancel is a 

 low building, contemporary with it, and entered 

 from the west by a door on the south of the altar, 

 which is the ' revestre ' built by Anthony Molyneux, 

 and still used for its original purpose. 



The nave arcades are of six bays with coarsely moulded 

 arches and piers, with four engaged shafts and moulded 

 capitals and bases. The clearstory has four-light windows 

 with uncusped tracery, the mullions crossing in the 

 head, and all the nave roofs are of flat pitch and 

 modern. The weathering of a former high-pitched 

 roof remains on the east wall of the west tower. 



The north chapel has a tall three-light east window 

 of early fourteenth-century style," and the contem- 

 porary north window is flat-headed, of three tre- 

 foiled lights with reticulated tracery. Below it is 

 an arched recess, now containing a late thirteenth- 

 century effigy, while a somewhat later one lies near 

 by. The second window from the east has three 

 cinquefoiled lights under a segmental head, and the two 

 others to the west of it three cinquefoiled lights with 

 tracery over. The north doorway is small and plain, 

 the principal entrance to the church being by the 

 south porch, which has a four-centred outer arch 

 with a shield and I H s at the apex, and an upper 

 story lighted on the south by a four-light square- 

 headed window. Above it is a canopied niche, and 

 the porch, like the rest of the aisles and the clear- 

 story, is finished with an embattled parapet and 

 short angle pinnacles. It retains its original flat 

 ceiling with heavy moulded oak beams, and the 

 Molyneux arms occur on the buttresses and the labels 

 of the outer arch. 



The west tower is of three stages with diagonal 

 buttresses at the western angles and a vice in the 

 south-west angle. The west window of the ground 

 story is of two trefoiled lights with a quatrefoil over, 

 and the four belfry windows are of the same type. 

 In the intermediate stage are small single trefoiled 

 lights. The tall stone spire is quite plain, and rises 

 from a plain parapet with four low conical angle 

 turrets. It is to be noted that a plinth of the same 

 section as that on the tower is continued round the 

 later part of the north aisle, suggesting that it may 

 be re-used material from the former north aisle, which 

 seems to have been contemporary with the tower.* 



The great interest of the church lies in its wood- 

 work and monuments. 



The rood screen, though damaged by repairs in 

 1820 and 1843, is a very fine example, with project- 

 ing canopies on either side. These are unfortunately 

 not in their original condition, the eastern canopy 



W. D. CarBe, Sefton, 64. 

 > Each member has a plain sunk chamfer. 

 8 Mr. Car8e notes that the north door seems to be cut through 

 such a plinth. Sefton, 8. 



having been formerly a canted tester with a panelled 

 soffit, and a brattishing of nine hanging cusped arches. 

 No other part of the rood loft remains, and the posi- 

 tion of the stair which led to it is doubtful. 



The screen has five openings, each with two cinque- 

 foiled arches in the head divided by a pendant, and 

 in the central opening are double doors, unfortunately 

 not the original ones, which were destroyed at one or 

 other of the dates mentioned above. The bands of 

 ornament on the rails and cornice are richly wrought, 

 and show a mixture of the Gothic vine-trail with 

 Renaissance detail, as already noted. The pendants of 

 the western canopies are finished with angels holding 

 shields with Molyneux bearings or the emblems of 

 the Passion. The openings of the screen, as well as 

 of the side screens of the chancel, are filled in with 

 iron stanchions ending in fleurs de lys ; these side 

 screens have good carved cornices and cresting, and 

 pierced tracery in the heads, but show no Italian 

 detail, and their lower panels are solid, with cinque- 

 foiled heads. They appear to have had canopies at 

 one time, and to have lost them in some repair. In 

 the west bay of the chancel are fourteen stalls, three 

 being returned on each side of the chancel door, their 

 floor level being two steps above that of the pavement, 

 and the desks are set on a stone base with quatrefoiled 

 openings to the area below the floor of the stalls. 

 The standards at the ends of the desks are carved with 

 a variety of devices, the lower part being in all a 

 conventional pineapple, while above are deer, a lion, 

 a unicorn, a griffin, an owl mobbed by small birds, 

 an eagle, an antelope, &c. The letters I M occur 

 here as before noted. The screen across the north 

 aisle, at the west of the Blundell chapel, is somewhat 

 plainer than the rest, but has a good carved cornice 

 and pierced tracery in the head of each opening, and 

 on the lower panels a plain fluted linen pattern show- 

 ing classic influence. Against the north wall of the 

 chapel is an early seventeenth-century seat with 

 panelled back and return benches on east and west, 

 and corresponding desks in front, having on the upper 

 part of one of the standards a seated squirrel, the 

 Blundell crest. 



At the east end of the south aisle is another late 

 Gothic screen of very rich detail with elaborately 

 carved uprights and solid lower panels with ornament 

 derived from the linen pattern, and on the top a 

 canopy projecting east and west, the east side being 

 canted like the former east canopy of the wood 

 screen, and the west side coved. Both have ribs and 

 a carved cornice with pendants, but the south end of 

 the screen has been damaged by galleries, and is now 

 partly hidden by the Sefton pew, which was formerly 

 on the north side of the nave, and is of the same 

 date and detail as the screen at the west of the 

 Blundell chapel. 



Both blocks of seats in the nave, twelve on each 

 side, belong probably to the second quarter of the 

 sixteenth century, and have good poppy heads and a 

 most interesting set of carved bench ends. Those in 

 the north block have crowned fleurs de lys on the four 

 corner bench ends, and the rest have, for the most 

 part, various conventional floral patterns. In the 

 south block the corner seats have the Molyneux cross, 

 while the rest have an alphabet, complete except for 

 x, y and z, one letter to each bench end. At first 

 sight they suggest some method of marking the seats 

 analogous to modern numbering, but the absence of 

 any such arrangement in the north block goes 



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