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St Nicholas

Tolleshunt Major

Essex

C12 fabric with C15

Architectural Features

early C16 detail, restored in C19.

Flint rubble and indurated gravel conglomerate, with limestone dressings, roofed with handmade red clay tiles.

Chancel and Nave in one piece, C12.

W tower, early C16.

The E window is C15, restored, of 3 cinquefoiled lights with vertical tracery in a 2-centred head, with moulded label, hollow-chamfered rear-arch and early wrought iron grill.

In the N wall is an early C16 archway of plastered brick, originally leading to a N chapel, now to the N vestry

the eastern is C15, partly restored, of 2 cinquefoiled lights in a square head, with an early wrought iron grill

Between them is a C15 doorway with moulded jambs, restored, and 2-centred arch in a square head with traceried spandrels and foliate bosses.

The S wallplate to the W of it has C14 mouldings

to the E it has C15 mouldings.

The Nave has in the N wall a C15 window of 2 cinquefoiled lights in a square head, with moulded label and early wrought iron grill.

E of the window is a blocked early C16 doorway of plastered brick, with jambs and 4-centred arch of 2 chamfered orders.

At the W end of the wall is an early C16 N doorway of stone, with moulded jambs, 2-centred arch and label, and contemporary brickwork above and around it

between them is the late C14/early C15 S doorway with 2-centred arch of 2 moulded orders, and jambs with 2 recessed chamfers.

The C14 roof of the Nave is in 2 bays, in addition to the base of a former bell-turret at the W end.

The early C16 W tower has diagonal buttresses to NW and SW, straight buttresses to the 2 E corners, and stair turret in the angle between the N side and the NE buttress.

The W window is of three 4-centred and transomed lights with tracery under a Tudor head

The second stage has in the S wall a double-chamfered loop, and in the W wall a window of two 4-centred lights with tracery, the jambs and mullions chamfered, with a Tudor head and moulded label.

The bell-chamber has in the S and W sides a window of 3 chamfered 4-centred lights with tracery under a Tudor head with moulded label.

The C14 font of Purbeck marbel is semi-octagonal, built against the S wall, 2 faces each having 2 shallow trefoil-headed panels, one having a shield and 2 having rosettes, with a moulded underside.

N of the tower-arch is an early C16 stoup with 4-centred head and plastered bowl.

There are fragmentary paintings on the S wall and W wall, N of the tower-arch, and mutilated double brick niches on the N and S walls, early C16.

There are 3 bells, the first uninscribed but probably pre-Reformation, the second by Thomas Gardiner of Sudbury, 1726, and the third late C14, inscribed 'Vox Edwardii sonet in Aure Dei'.

P. Morant states that the N chapel was in use in 1609, when an alabaster monument to Stephen Beckingham was installed in it