St Mary's Church is a
redundant Church of England parish church in the
civil parish
In England, a civil parish is a type of administrative parish used for local government. It is a territorial designation which is the lowest tier of local government below districts and counties, or their combined form, the unitary authorit ...
of
Chilton,
Suffolk, England. It is a
Grade I listed building
In the United Kingdom, a listed building or listed structure is one that has been placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Historic Environment Scotland in Scotland, in Wales, and the Northern Irel ...
,
and is in 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 ...
.
The church is about south of the
Tudor Chilton Hall and east-northeast of the centre of
Sudbury. To the north and east it is surrounded by farmland. To the south and west are the Sudbury eastern bypass and associated modern buildings on the outskirts of Sudbury.
[
]
History
The nave and chancel of the church are Perpendicular Gothic, built of flint in the 15th century. The south porch is also flint, but with brick quoins.
In the 16th century the Crane chapel north of the chancel and the west tower were added, and a Tudor window was inserted in the nave over the north doorway. All the 16th-century additions are built of brick.
The Crane chapel was built as a chantry
A chantry is an ecclesiastical term that may have either of two related meanings:
# a chantry service, a Christian liturgy of prayers for the dead, which historically was an obiit, or
# a chantry chapel, a building on private land, or an area i ...
chapel housing the table tombs of George Crane, who died in 1491, and Robert Crane, who died in 1500, and his wife. There is an alabaster
Alabaster is a mineral or rock that is soft, often used for carving, and is processed for plaster powder. Archaeologists and the stone processing industry use the word differently from geologists. The former use it in a wider sense that include ...
recumbent effigy of George Crane on his tomb. After the Reformation
The Reformation (alternatively named the Protestant Reformation or the European Reformation) was a major movement within Western Christianity in 16th-century Europe that posed a religious and political challenge to the Catholic Church and in ...
the chapel continued as the Crane family mausoleum with the addition of the wall-mounted monument to Sir Robert Crane and his two wives. Sir Robert died in 1643 but he had the monument carved in 1626 by Gerard Christmas.[
By the 1970s the small population of the parish of Chilton could no longer support the church. The ]Diocese of St Edmundsbury and Ipswich
The Diocese of St Edmundsbury and Ipswich is a Church of England diocese based in Ipswich, covering Suffolk (excluding Lowestoft). The cathedral is St Edmundsbury Cathedral, and the bishop is the Bishop of St Edmundsbury and Ipswich. It is part ...
merged the benefice with that of St Gregory's Church, Sudbury and declared St Mary's redundant. In the 1980s the church building was vested in the care of the Churches Conservation Trust.
Architecture
The west tower has substantial brick angle buttresses. The tower and nave have flint battlement
A battlement in defensive architecture, such as that of city walls or castles, comprises a parapet (i.e., a defensive low wall between chest-height and head-height), in which gaps or indentations, which are often rectangular, occur at interv ...
s and the tower has crocket
A crocket (or croquet) is a small, independent decorative element common in Gothic architecture. The name derives from the diminutive of the French ''croc'', meaning "hook", due to the resemblance of crockets to a bishop's crosier.
Description
...
ted pinnacles at the four corners. The Crane chapel is of two bays and its two northern corners have diagonal buttresses. The south porch has a moulded brick parapet.[
]
See also
*
References
Further reading
*
External links
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Chilton, Saint Mary
15th-century church buildings in England
Church of England church buildings in Suffolk
Churches preserved by the Churches Conservation Trust
English Gothic architecture in Suffolk
Grade I listed churches in Suffolk
Babergh District