CHURCH OF ST MARY THE VIRGIN
FAIRFORD, GLOUCESTERSHIRE
AIDAN MCRAE THOMSON
WENDY HARRIS & PAUL SCOTT
A brief history of this Church together with a satellite image and a Church plan are given below. However, if you want to begin your tour of the Church immediately, tap / click on START . You can also access intermediate points in the tour by a tap / click on the following links:
NOTE ON MAGNIFYING IMAGES
With this website format the images are large enough for most purposes. If there is a need for greater magnification of an image, go to the identical photo on
https://www.flickr.com/photos/amthomson/sets/72157718888199692/
or
https://www.flickr.com/photos/pefkosmad/albums/72157635426769718
SATELLITE VIEW
The Church of St Mary the Virgin has a beautiful park setting with many trees and headstones. The park is bounded to the west by the River Coln.
The Church has a geographical east-west axis, with the sanctuary extending to the east. This means that our liturgical and geographical directions coincide. The Church is essentially rectangular in shape with a central tower. Each of the nave aisles extends to a chapel East of the tower, and there is a vestry in the Northeast corner, filling in that corner of the rectangular shape. A large porch near the Southwest corner provides the main entry to the Church.
We shall begin our exploration from the High Street near the Parish Office, walking around the Church in an anticlockwise direction, before entering via the South porch.
PLAN
We shall enter by the South porch, and explore in turn the nave, the Corpus Christi Chapel, the Lady Chapel, and finally the chancel and sanctuary.
St Mary’s Church is famous for its complete set of medieval windows. As well, there are a couple of historic tombs, and a number of simple monuments commemorating mostly local identities. An excellent coverage of these monuments can be found at
https://www.fairfordhistory.org.uk/monuments-of-st-marys-church/
The red numbers on the plan are the Church guide numbers for the Church windows. We shall use these as window references in the text.
HISTORY
Year Built: 1497
Address: High Street, Fairford, England
Simon Jenkins’ Rating: *****
55 Major British Churches: x
St Mary’s Church is a Church of England church in Fairford, Gloucestershire, England. It is notable for its complete set of 28 medieval stained-glass windows, one of the best-preserved in England. Part of the tower dates from the early 15th century. The church was rebuilt at the end of the 15th century by John Tame (c.1430–1500), a wealthy local wool merchant. It is a Grade I listed building in the Perpendicular style.
Tame rebuilt the church purposely to install his stained glass, and thus the design is ‘necessarily somewhat cramped’. The church was consecrated in 1497 by the Bishop of Worcester, within whose diocese lay most of Gloucestershire at that time. It consists of a chancel, nave, a tower between them, and two aisles, which extend without any external break to about half the length of the chancel. According to J.M. Neale, ‘This arrangement, necessary to secure the required number of windows, somewhat injures the effect of the exterior, and makes the distinction between chancel and nave less marked than might have been wished’. The entire length is 125 feet, and the breadth is 55 feet.
The fittings of the church are of the most beautiful and costly character. The chancel is furnished with fourteen elaborate misereres, and a rood-screen, and lateral parcloses (screens) of exquisite design and in remarkable preservation. The whole floor is paved in chequers of blue and white marble; and the roof of every part is excellently carved wood, with good corbels both for the principal and secondary rafters. The north aisle is the manorial chapel of the Tames and of their successors as lords of the manor of Fairford.
Exterior
The tower is the principal feature on the exterior: its plan is square, the edges however being taken off and adorned with niches. There is a pierced embattled parapet, with four angular pinnacles. There are four heraldic shields on the greater string course, in bold relief. That on the western side is charged with the arms of Tame; that on the north bears: Quarterly, first and fourth, a bend; second and third, a fret (Despencer, Earl of Gloucester). On the south is Chequy, a chevron (Newburgh, arms borne by Thomas de Beaumont, 6th Earl of Warwick and later quartered by Beauchamp, Earl of Warwick); and on the east Three chevronels for de Clare, Earl of Gloucester, who all at some time owned the manor of Fairford. There is an elaborate south-western porch, with a parvise over it. This has been since thrown open to the church, and is furnished with a projecting gallery, which serves as a pew.
Stained-glass windows
The pre-Reformation medieval stained glass panes are of national historical and architectural importance as they constitute what is ‘probably the most complete set of medieval stained glass in Britain’, consisting of 28 windows displaying biblical scenes. They were added after the church was rebuilt in the 1490s by John Tame, under the instructions of his son Edward Tame. The glass was made between 1500 and 1517 and the panes are now attributed to the Flemish glazier Barnard Flower (d.1517), glazier to King Henry VII. According to some sources, John Thornton of Coventry and Galyon Hone were also associated with the Netherlandish Renaissance painted glass at this church.
The glass survived the destruction that was common during the Reformation and the English Civil War in a more complete state than at any other parish church in England.
During the Second World War, the stained glass windows were removed and stored in a cellar for safekeeping from 1939 to 1945. A conservation and restoration programme began in 1988 and finished in 2010. Clear glass now protects the old glass.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St_Mary%27s_Church,_Fairford
