St Mary's Church is a

redundant Redundancy or redundant may refer to: Language * Redundancy (linguistics), information that is expressed more than once Engineering and computer science * Data redundancy, database systems which have a field that is repeated in two or more table ...

Anglican Anglicanism, also known as Episcopalianism in some countries, is a Western Christianity, Western Christian tradition which developed from the practices, liturgy, and identity of the Church of England following the English Reformation, in the ...

church in the village of

Little Hormead Little Hormead is a village in the civil parish of Hormead, in the East Hertfordshire district, in the county of Hertfordshire, ENgland. It is a few miles away from the small town of Buntingford and near the village of Great Hormead. In 1931, the ...

Hertfordshire Hertfordshire ( or ; often abbreviated Herts) is a ceremonial county in the East of England and one of the home counties. It borders Bedfordshire to the north-west, Cambridgeshire to the north-east, Essex to the east, Greater London to the ...

, England. It is recorded in the

National Heritage List for England The National Heritage List for England (NHLE) is England's official database of protected heritage assets. It includes details of all English listed buildings, scheduled monuments, register of historic parks and gardens, protected shipwrecks, ...

as a designated 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 ...

, and is under 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 particularly noted for its Norman door, made of wood and ironwork. It is described as a "work of outstanding importance", and a "rare and precious survival".

History

The church dates from the 11th century. It was recorded in the

Domesday Book Domesday Book ( ; the Middle English spelling of "Doomsday Book") is a manuscript record of the Great Survey of much of England and parts of Wales completed in 1086 at the behest of William the Conqueror. The manuscript was originally known by ...

as serving the villages of Little Hormead and Great Hormead. 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 rebuilt in the early 13th century and a

bellcote A bellcote, bell-cote or bell-cot is a small framework and shelter for one or more bells. Bellcotes are most common in church architecture but are also seen on institutions such as schools. The bellcote may be carried on brackets projecting from ...

was added in the 15th century. A south porch was added in the 18th century. In 1888 the church was

restored ''Restored'' is the fourth studio album by American contemporary Christian musician Jeremy Camp. It was released on November 16, 2004, by BEC Recordings. Track listing Standard release Enhanced edition Deluxe gold edition Standard Aus ...

, during which the east end was rebuilt and the bellcote was reconstructed. In the 13th century St Nicholas' Church had been built in Great Hormead, and Little Hormead lost its independent rector in 1886. It was

vested In law, vesting is the point in time when the rights and interests arising from legal ownership of a property are acquired by some Legal person, person. Vesting creates an immediately secured right of present or future deployment. One has a vest ...

in the Churches Conservation Trust in 1995.

Architecture

Exterior

St Mary's is constructed in

flint Flint, occasionally flintstone, is a sedimentary cryptocrystalline form of the mineral quartz, categorized as the variety of chert that occurs in chalk or marly limestone. Historically, flint was widely used to make stone tools and start ...

with stone dressings. The south porch is in brick, and the roofs have red tiles. The bellcote is timber with a pyramidal roof. There is a

canonical sundial A tide dial, also known as a mass dial or a scratch dial, is a sundial marked with the canonical hours rather than or in addition to the standard hours of daylight. Such sundials were particularly common between the 7th and 14th centuries in Europ ...

on the south wall. The plan of the church consists of a tall narrow

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 ...

without

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, ...

s, a chancel at a lower level, a south porch, and a bellcote at the west end. Much of the church is

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 ...

in style, particularly the nave. This includes the north and south doorways, a north window and the chancel arch. The south window in the nave dates from the 15th century. The two-light west window was inserted during the 1888 restoration and is in

Perpendicular In geometry, two geometric objects are perpendicular if they intersect at right angles, i.e. at an angle of 90 degrees or π/2 radians. The condition of perpendicularity may be represented graphically using the '' perpendicular symbol'', � ...

style. The east window in the chancel is a triple lancet. In the south wall of the chancel are two 13th-century lancet windows, a large 15th-century window, and a priest's door.

Interior

The octagonal

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 ...

dates from the early 14th century and has panels of blank

tracery Tracery is an architectural device by which windows (or screens, panels, and vaults) are divided into sections of various proportions by stone ''bars'' or ''ribs'' of moulding. Most commonly, it refers to the stonework elements that support th ...

around its bowl. In the southeast corner of the chancel is a 15th-century

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 ...

. Above the chancel arch is a carved and painted Royal coat of arms of Charles II dated 1660. The 12th-century north door, described as having a "most lavish display" of ironwork, is no longer "''in situ''", but is preserved inside the church. It consists of two interlacing quatrefoil patterns, around which is a border containing scrolls, all of which is surmounted by a serpentine

dragon A dragon is a Magic (supernatural), magical legendary creature that appears in the folklore of multiple cultures worldwide. Beliefs about dragons vary considerably through regions, but European dragon, dragons in Western cultures since the Hi ...

Dendrochronology Dendrochronology (or tree-ring dating) is the scientific method of chronological dating, dating tree rings (also called growth rings) to the exact year they were formed in a tree. As well as dating them, this can give data for dendroclimatology, ...

has confirmed that the trees from which the door is built were felled between about 1130 and about 1150.

References

External links