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St Peter's Church, church-2.jpg, 41.8kB

St Peter's Church, by Steve Wallhead, 1979

This sketch appeared on a Christmas card, sold in aid of parish church funds. St Peter's is at the bottom of Church Lane, and is also reached from Nurses Lane, from where this sketch was taken.

The following text is from Leicestershire and Rutland in The Buildings of England by Sir Nikolaus Pevsner, revised for the 2nd edition by Elizabeth Williamson. Penguin Books 1984, ISBN 0 14 071018 3.

ST PETER. Of ironstone. Externally the general appearance is Perp, but there is a good deal of earlier work. Unbuttressed C 13 tower with lancets below and twin bell-openings of plate tracery with quatrefoil heads. Heavy broad tower arch with semicircular responds and a double-chamfered arch. Perp top stage, with two-light panel-tracery belfry windows and battlements, added no doubt when the tall clerestory was built. Recessed spire with two tiers of lucarnes in the cardinal directions. Chancel fabric also probably C 13, see the nailhead on the chancel arch capitals and the triple sedilia (seats for the priests on the S side of the chancel) with detached shafts. The transepts are more difficult to date but are probably also C 13, see the string course in the N transept, the blocked window in its W wall, and the keeled base to the S arcade E respond. Fragments of a nailhead frieze in the S transept seem reset. The arcade piers are also hard to date. They consist of a square core set angle-wise and given four semicircular projections. The piers at the W end of the transept have thin capitals charmingly decorated, on the N side with heads, on the S side with curly clouds and demi-figures of angels holding various objects (e.g. the sun and the moon). Double-chamfered arches, hoodmoulds on good head stops. Their style seems to indicate a late C 14 date, but the S capital strikes one as likely to be later, and the N capital carries an abacus of ballflower. Much Perp refenestration. Of a series of C 19 restorations between 1864 and 1875 (including one of the chancel by Goddard & Son, 1867-8) the most important contribution was the fine E window by W. Slater, 1864. Nave restored by R. H. Carpenter in 1873. Unusual C 14 altar, triple-arched to match the sedilia.

STAINED GLASS. By A. Gibbs c. 1865 in the E and W windows.

MONUMENTS. In the S transept. Large effigy of a cross-legged knight; late C 13. - Sir Thomas Berkley and his wife who died in 1488. Incised slab on a tomb-chest decorated with shields in pointed quatrefoils. - Sir Morys Berkeley and his wife who died in 1521. Brasses; only hers remain (2ft 5½in.). - Base of a cross to the E of the porch.

GRAMMAR SCHOOL (former), in the churchyard N of the church. Founded in 1637 by Sir John Sedley. Oblong with mullioned windows and a four-centred door-head. E of this two gabled cottages apparently also of C 17.


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