Holy Cross 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, ...

Bearsted Bearsted ( , ) is a village and civil parishes in England, civil parish with a railway station in mid-Kent, England, two miles (3.2 km) east of Maidstone town centre. Geography The village was historically concentrated around Church Lan ...

Kent Kent is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South East England. It is bordered by Essex across the Thames Estuary to the north, the Strait of Dover to the south-east, East Sussex to the south-west, Surrey to the west, and Gr ...

. Its construction began in the 13th century.

Building

Construction of the church began in the 13th century and continued in stages during the 14th and 15th centuries. It is built of local

rag-stone Rag-stone is a name given by some architectural writers to work done with stones that are quarried in thin pieces, such as Horsham Stone, sandstone, Yorkshire stone, and the slate stones, but this is more properly flag or slab work. Near Londo ...

and the roofs are covered with plain tiles. 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 ...

is flanked by a single

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, ...

on the north side and entered from a porch on the south side. At the west end of the nave is a square three-storey tower with a

crenellated A battlement, in defensive architecture, such as that of city walls or castles, comprises a parapet (a defensive low wall between chest-height and head-height), in which gaps or indentations, which are often rectangular, occur at intervals ...

parapet A parapet is a barrier that is an upward extension of a wall at the edge of a roof, terrace, balcony, walkway or other structure. The word comes ultimately from the Italian ''parapetto'' (''parare'' 'to cover/defend' and ''petto'' 'chest/brea ...

, a stair turret on its south-east corner and staggered

buttress A buttress is an architectural structure built against or projecting from a wall which serves to support or reinforce the wall. Buttresses are fairly common on more ancient (typically Gothic) buildings, as a means of providing support to act ...

es on the other three corners. Three stone beasts sit on the corners of the parapet. These are replacements of originals eroded over time, which may have originally represented three

wolves The wolf (''Canis lupus''; : wolves), also known as the grey wolf or gray wolf, is a canine native to Eurasia and North America. More than thirty subspecies of ''Canis lupus'' have been recognized, including the dog and dingo, though gr ...

from the ancestor of Fludd line Rhirid Flaidd coat of arms. The

arcade Arcade most often refers to: * Arcade game, a coin-operated video, pinball, electro-mechanical, redemption, etc., game ** Arcade video game, a coin-operated video game ** Arcade cabinet, housing which holds an arcade video game's hardware ** Arcad ...

between the nave and aisle has four bays and was constructed in the 14th century with the two at the east end rebuilt in the 15th century. A single arch at the west end of the arcade is possibly

Anglo-Saxon The Anglo-Saxons, in some contexts simply called Saxons or the English, were a Cultural identity, cultural group who spoke Old English and inhabited much of what is now England and south-eastern Scotland in the Early Middle Ages. They traced t ...

. The south wall of the nave contains a stair to the

rood loft The rood screen (also choir screen, chancel screen, or jubé) is a common feature in late medieval church architecture. It is typically an ornate partition between the chancel and nave, of more or less open tracery constructed of wood, stone, or ...

. 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 ...

contains 13th-century sedile and

piscina A piscina is a shallow basin placed near the altar of a church, or else in the vestry or sacristy, used for washing the communion vessels. The sacrarium is the drain itself. Lutherans and Anglicans usually refer to the basin, calling it a pisci ...

. Restoration of the church includes 19th-century panelling and pews in the nave and aisle, followed by 20th-century replacement of much of the roof. The windows are generally small, except for those at the east end of the nave and aisle and above the doorway in the west wall of the tower. The south wall of the church features 13th-century

lancet window A lancet window is a tall, narrow window with a sharp pointed arch at its top. This arch may or may not be a steep lancet arch (in which the compass centres for drawing the arch fall outside the opening). It acquired the "lancet" name from its rese ...

s on the left of the porch and in the chancel. The windows on the north side are 14th century. The church features monuments to Margarete and Steven Mason (died 1552 and 1560), Henrye Brockill of Aldington (died 1596), Susanna Cage (died 1634) and floor tablets to Eleonor, John and Guillemo Cage (late 17th century). Elizabeth Andras (died 1592), wife of Sir Thomas Fludd, and her son

Robert Fludd Robert Fludd, also known as Robertus de Fluctibus (17 January 1574 – 8 September 1637), was a prominent English Paracelsian physician with both scientific and occult interests. He is remembered as an astrologer, mathematician, cosmol ...

, the physician and occultist (died 1637), are also commemorated with memorials in the church, the later with a bust on a plinth. The Milgate Chantry is a fourteenth century chantry located to the north of the aisle. It was suppressed in 1536, and subsequently belonged to the owners of

Milgate House, Thurnham Milgate House, previously Milgate Park, is an English country house in Thurnham near Maidstone, Kent. The oldest parts of the house were constructed in the mid to late 16th century and alterations and additions were made in the 17th and 18th cent ...

. From the 1560s until 1624 this was the Fludd family. The church sits in a small

churchyard In Christian countries, a churchyard is a patch of land adjoining or surrounding a church (building), church, which is usually owned by the relevant church or local parish itself. In the Scots language and in both Scottish English and Ulster S ...

to which is attached a larger graveyard to the east. John Dyke, the last man hanged on

Penenden Heath Penenden Heath is a suburb of the town of Maidstone in the English county of Kent. As the name suggests, it was developed on an area of heathland, an area of which remains as a recreation ground with some woodland. History Before the expansi ...

, in 1830, is buried in the graveyard. The church is a Grade I

listed building In the United Kingdom, a listed building is a structure of particular architectural or historic interest deserving of special protection. Such buildings are placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Hi ...

(listed since 1967), and the churchyard contains three table tombs and the village war memorial which are listed Grade II.

References

External links

*
Corpus Vitrearum Medii Aevi, Bearsted: Holy Cross
Image of the medieval stained glass window in north aisle. {{DEFAULTSORT:Bearsted, Holy Cross Church 13th-century church buildings in England 14th-century church buildings in England 15th-century church buildings in England Borough of Maidstone Grade I listed churches in Kent Church of England church buildings in Kent Diocese of Canterbury

Building

See also

References

External links