St Peter's Church, Tickencote is a

Church of England The Church of England (C of E) is the established Christian church in England and the mother church of the international Anglican Communion. It traces its history to the Christian church recorded as existing in the Roman province of Britai ...

parish church A parish church (or parochial church) in Christianity is the church which acts as the religious centre of a parish. In many parts of the world, especially in rural areas, the parish church may play a significant role in community activitie ...

in Tickencote,

Rutland Rutland () is a ceremonial county and unitary authority in the East Midlands, England. The county is bounded to the west and north by Leicestershire, to the northeast by Lincolnshire and the southeast by Northamptonshire. Its greatest l ...

. Apart from the chancel arch and the sexpartite vaulting in the chancel, which are

Norman Norman or Normans may refer to: Ethnic and cultural identity * The Normans, a people partly descended from Norse Vikings who settled in the territory of Normandy in France in the 10th and 11th centuries ** People or things connected with the Norm ...

and date from the mid 12th century, the building was rebuilt in 1792 at the expense of Miss Eliza Wingfield by the architect

Samuel Pepys Cockerell Samuel Pepys Cockerell (1753–1827) was an English architect. He was a son of John Cockerell, of Bishop's Hull, Somerset, and the elder brother of Sir Charles Cockerell, 1st Baronet, for whom he designed the house he is best known for, Sezinc ...

. In 2019 the church passed into the care of the

Churches Conservation Trust The Churches Conservation Trust is a registered charity whose purpose is to protect historic churches at risk in England. The charity cares for over 350 churches of architectural, cultural and historic significance, which have been transferred in ...

. While St Peter's underwent significant repair, the church was closed to visitors until June 2022.

Architectural description

The church consists of a three bay nave, a chancel, tower of two storeys and a bell-stage on the south side and a transept on the north side which is used as a

vestry A vestry was a committee for the local secular and ecclesiastical government for a parish in England, Wales and some English colonies which originally met in the vestry or sacristy of the parish church, and consequently became known colloquial ...

. The tower also acts as an entrance porch. The church is built of the local limestone with

Collyweston slate The Collyweston Slater pub in Collyweston with a Collyweston slate roof Collyweston stone slate is a traditional roofing material found in central England. It is not a proper slate but a limestone found in narrow beds. It is considerably heav ...

roofs and coped gables.

Chancel

The church now consists of a chancel with a

sexpartite vault In architecture, a sexpartite vault is a rib vault divided into six bays by two diagonal ribs and three transverse ribs. The principal examples are those in the Abbaye-aux-Hommes and Abbaye-aux-Dames at Caen (which were probably the earliest e ...

. The vaulting with its carving is original but may have been re-constructed when 1792 the church was rebuilt and the chancel was encased with stonework, decorated in

Romanesque revival style Romanesque Revival (or Neo-Romanesque) is a style of building employed beginning in the mid-19th century inspired by the 11th- and 12th-century Romanesque architecture. Unlike the historic Romanesque style, Romanesque Revival buildings tended to ...

. The restored east end of the chancel has blind arcades of intersecting round-headed arches and engaged round shafts. Round-headed east window with stylized leaf-mouldings and billet-moulded hood mould continuing as frieze to either side. Taller, narrower window lights the priest's chamber which was above the chancel, but which is now blocked and inaccessible. Two orders of blind round-headed arcading above billet frieze. Blind rectangular panels in the east gable. On the north and south sides of chancel are arcade and billet friezes. Inside the chancel, there is, in a recess, a 14th-century wooden effigy and there is a wooden altar table of 1627.

Chancel arch

The most import and impressive feature of the church is the round-headed chancel arch the mid 12th century. This arch has six elaborately decorated orders on ornamental capitals. The inner order is roll-moulded, the second has beak-heads, the third has zig-zags and continuous crenellation, the fourth various heads including those of a king and queen, figures, animals, a

green man The Green Man is a legendary being primarily interpreted as a symbol of rebirth, representing the cycle of new growth that occurs every spring. The Green Man is most commonly depicted in a sculpture, or other representation of a face which is ...

and foliage and the fifth with zig-zags and the sixth an abstract version of beak mouldings. The outermost edge of the arch is decorated with billet moulding.

Tower and porch

The tower has pyramidal roof contains bells which until 1792 hung in a bell-cote at the west end of the chancel. The tower acts as a porch and the round-headed entrance has roll-moulded orders and tympanum with a tablet to Eliza Wingfield, at whose expense the 1792 restoration was undertaken.

Nave and font

The

nave The nave () is the central part of a church, stretching from the (normally western) main entrance or rear wall, to the transepts, or in a church without transepts, to the chancel. When a church contains side aisles, as in a basilica-typ ...

, which was later medieval, was completely rebuilt in the 1792 restoration. The

font In movable type, metal typesetting, a font is a particular #Characteristics, size, weight and style of a typeface. Each font is a matched set of type, with a piece (a "Sort (typesetting), sort") for each glyph. A typeface consists of a range of ...

which is Romanesque, is slightly later in date than the chancel arch. The font currently is positioned close to the arch, but an eighteenth-century plan shows that it was originally closer to the west end on the north side.''Page'' (1935), pg. 276 The exterior decoration of the nave is a much freer interpretation of the Romanesque style and must be considered one of the earliest examples of

Romanesque Revival architecture Romanesque Revival (or Neo-Romanesque) is a style of building employed beginning in the mid-19th century inspired by the 11th- and 12th-century Romanesque architecture. Unlike the historic Romanesque style, Romanesque Revival buildings tended to ...

in the British Isles.

Burials

* Thomas Cromwell, 1st Earl of Ardglass, and his wife Elizabeth * Sir Edward Wingfield and his wife Mary Georgina

Gallery

References

Sources

* *Camden W (ed Richard Gough), (1806) ''Britannia'', 2nd Edition, Vol.2. 329, Pl VII *

Gentleman's Magazine ''The Gentleman's Magazine'' was a monthly magazine founded in London, England, by Edward Cave in January 1731. It ran uninterrupted for almost 200 years, until 1922. It was the first to use the term ''magazine'' (from the French ''magazine'' ...

, (1806), i, pg 34.

External links

Simon Jenkins Sir Simon David Jenkins (born 10 June 1943) is a British author, a newspaper columnist and editor. He was editor of the ''Evening Standard'' from 1976 to 1978 and of ''The Times'' from 1990 to 1992. Jenkins chaired the National Trust from 20 ...

br>''Great English Churches''
*Page W. (1935)
Parishes: Tickencote
, in ''A History of the County of Rutland'': Volume 2, ed. William Page (London, 1935), pp. 275–281. British History Online ccessed 19 June 2017 {{DEFAULTSORT:Tickencote, St Peter's Church Grade I listed churches in Rutland Church of England church buildings in Rutland English churches with Norman architecture Churches preserved by the Churches Conservation Trust