The Church of St Andrew and St Mary is a

parish church A parish church (or parochial church) in Christianity is the Church (building), 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 com ...

of the

Church of England The Church of England (C of E) is the State religion#State churches, established List of Christian denominations, Christian church in England and the Crown Dependencies. It is the mother church of the Anglicanism, Anglican Christian tradition, ...

located in the village of

Grantchester Grantchester () is a village and civil parish on the River Cam or Granta (river), Granta in South Cambridgeshire, England. It lies about south of Cambridge. Name The village of Grantchester is listed in the 1086 Domesday Book as ''Granteset ...

, Cambridgeshire, England.

History

The oldest part of the current church building dates from the 12th century. The

chancel In church architecture, the chancel is the space around the altar, including the Choir (architecture), choir and the sanctuary (sometimes called the presbytery), at the liturgical east end of a traditional Christian church building. It may termi ...

was built in the 14th century, while 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-type ...

and

bell tower A bell tower is a tower that contains one or more bells, or that is designed to hold bells even if it has none. Such a tower commonly serves as part of a Christian church, and will contain church bells, but there are also many secular bell to ...

date from the 15th century. It was constructed using

clunch Clunch is a traditional building material of chalky limestone rock used mainly in eastern England and Normandy. Clunch distinguishes itself from archetypal forms of limestone by being softer in character when cut, and may resemble chalk in lowe ...

and

fieldstone Fieldstone is a naturally occurring type of stone, which lies at or near the surface of the Earth. Fieldstone is a nuisance for farmers seeking to expand their land under cultivation, but at some point it began to be used as a construction mate ...

. There was also a small transseptal chapel built in the 1400s but which was demolished in the 18th century. A 19th-century restoration saw the construction of a south

aisle An aisle is a linear space for walking with rows of non-walking spaces on both sides. Aisles with seating on both sides can be seen in airplanes, in buildings such as churches, cathedrals, synagogues, meeting halls, parliaments, courtrooms, ...

in the 1870s and an extensive restoration of the

between 1876 and 1877. The tower includes three bells.

Corpus Christi College, Cambridge Corpus Christi College (full name: "The College of Corpus Christi and the Blessed Virgin Mary", often shortened to "Corpus") is a Colleges of the University of Cambridge, constituent college of the University of Cambridge. From the late 14th c ...

has been a patron of the church since 1352.

Interior

The church has several stained glass windows which mainly date from the 19th century. There is a

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 9th and 10th centuries ** People or things connected with the Norma ...

baptismal

font In metal typesetting, a font is a particular size, weight and style of a ''typeface'', defined as the set of fonts that share an overall design. For instance, the typeface Bauer Bodoni (shown in the figure) includes fonts " Roman" (or "regul ...

, and the 17th century

pulpit A pulpit is a raised stand for preachers in a Christian church. The origin of the word is the Latin ''pulpitum'' (platform or staging). The traditional pulpit is raised well above the surrounding floor for audibility and visibility, accesse ...

is believed to have come from the chapel of Corpus Christi College,. The organ was built in 1851.

Popular culture

The church is used in the

ITV ITV or iTV may refer to: Television TV stations/networks/channels ITV *Independent Television (ITV), a British television network and company, including: **ITV (TV network), a free-to-air national commercial television network in the United Kingd ...

drama titled ''

'' shown in the UK from autumn 2014
and filmed on location in Grantchester. The drama is the adaptation of

James Runcie James Robert Runcie (born 7 May 1959) is a British novelist, documentary filmmaker, television producer and playwright. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and a visiting professor at Bath Spa University and was Commissioning Edi ...

's sleuth novels '' The Grantchester Mysteries''.

References

{{Reflist

External links

Interesting people buried in Grantchester Churchyard
from the Friends Of Grantchester Church newsletter Church of England church buildings in Cambridgeshire 12th-century church buildings in England 14th-century church buildings in England 15th-century church buildings in England English Gothic architecture in Cambridgeshire Grade II* listed churches in Cambridgeshire Grantchester