St Denys Church
Built of local ironstone St Denys church has stood here for many centuries, its earliest surviving parts being from the 1100s. History suggests it was preceded by a wooden Saxon church on the same site. The architectural styles are Early English (1189-1372), but the structure now seen is substantially 13th century with 15th century alterations. Ironstone has a mellow golden orange colour but is very susceptible to weathering, as can easily be seen on exterior parts of the church building. Uniquely in the area the spire of St Denys is constructed of ironstone, rather than a harder stone.
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The spire carries a clock which chimes hourly and as such is a valued aspect of village life – it was installed through public subscription by the villagers in 1919, in memory of those who died in WW1.
There are six bells in a ground floor ring which are rung by local and visiting ringers, and are enjoyed as an easy and mellow set of bells.
The Tenor bell was originally cast in 1589 (recast 1902), and the third and fourth bells date from the 17C which makes them of historic and social interest.
Bells details are as follows:
Treble 1946 John Taylor & Co GIFT OF THOMAS EDGAR PEARSON
2 1884 John Taylor & Co LAUS DEO
3 1618 Hugh II Watts ALL GLORY BEE TO GOD MOST HIGH
4 1628 George I Oldfield GOD SAVE HIS CHURCH
5 1858 John Taylor & Co S. THOROLD
Tenor 1589 John Taylor & Co IHESUS BE OUR SPEED (Recast 1902)
The church contains the village War Memorial erected after the First World War and added to after the second. This commemorates the names of 13 fallen men of the community. Some of the men are antecedents of families still living in Eaton.
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The church building
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The church consists of a chancel, nave, north and south aisles, porch, and a tower surmounted by a stone spire. The church displays many thirteenth-century features throughout, with evidence of two early individual side chapels occupying the north and south aisles. These aisles each have a piscina built into the fabric of the church and indicates the former existence of altars.
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The chancel
The chancel is the earliest aspect of the church built, and originally had a priest’s door on the north side. This is now visible only from within the boiler house on the north side of the chancel. It has a pointed arch and is of Early English design. This feature must be earlier than the north aisle as it has been blocked-up and part of the archway has become embedded in the stonework. The masonry into which the Priest’s door is set is very crude and suggests a survival of the earliest building phase.
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The floor of the chancel is the same level as the nave, which shows that the work of Puritan times in 1642 when chancel steps were removed and church floors levelled throughout, with just the altar remaining raised by one step at the east end. Evidence of a higher chancel roofline is preserved in the fabric of the adjoining nave wall. The chancel roof is of sixteenth-century canted tie beams with king post spur to ridge piece.
The floor of the Chancel was formerly used for the interment of medieval patrons. There is a sealed vault beneath the chancel floor on the north side for the burial of the Rodgers family. Monuments to this family are displayed on the north chancel wall and there are a further three memorial monuments on the floor behind the alter
There is a three-light east window, which replaces a different design seen in photographs dating to 1905.
A single thirteenth-century lancet window is set into the north chancel wall, which is probably the earliest surviving medieval construction. There is also a pair of two-light 'Y' traceried gothic windows on the south wall. It is suggested that the window to the left, in the south wall of the chancel, is a ‘leper’s’ window – so built that a person standing outside could view the altar as the sacrament was consecrated by the priest, without entering the church.
Carved slate memorial slab for Anthony Rodgers
The Nave
The nave comprises of a three bay arcade supported by cylindrical piers set upon waterfold bases. There are fourteenth-century polygonal capitals to the north of the nave and Early English circular ones with nailhead decoration to the south. There is Late Norman (c.1150-89) nailhead ornamentation on the capitals of the two centre pillars in the south aisle, and also on those of the south doorway. A fossilised roofline can be seen on the internal tower wall, which reveals the original height of the nave.
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Nave Carvings
A circular stone shelf at the chancel end of the south aisle may have once supported a figure, the base is carved into a comical impish face and is only visible if viewed from below. The stone corbels supporting roof timbers in both aisles and the nave are carved as grotesque figureheads.
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The various wainscot panels covering the lower half of both aisles derive from the old box pews which once segregated the church-goers up to the early twentieth century. Further evidence of this can be seen as slots gouged-out on several of the piers. The box pews were removed and wooden chairs introduced in 1905
The chancel and nave are separated by a fine old oak chancel screen. This rood screen has been dated to the late fifteenth-century using dendrochronology. The screen comprises of four cusped ogee lights to the left and right of a wavy central opening. There is a moulded cornice above, with traceried dado below. The iron bracket on this screen may have held an hourglass dating to the seventeenth-century; the timer was used when the sermons often lasted an hour. Carvings decorating the much more recent pulpit echo those on the rood screen.
Clerestory
The clerestory is a fifteenth-century construction pierced by three two-light perpendicular windows on both sides, those on the south side having triangular hood mouldings, whereas those to the north are square. The addition of a clerestory was a common addition to medieval churches and was an attempt to lighten an otherwise gloomy interior.
North aisle
The north aisle has a door which has badly eroded dogtooth ornamentation decorating the external arch. Fragments of medieval stained glass have survived in two late fourteenth-century ogee aisle windows. The glass is in situ and appears to represent a running oakleaf motif.
In the east end is sited a stained glass window featuring St Denys, dedicated to the Woodcock family, inserted in 1975. This chapel contains a piscina set into the wall, and evidence for access up to what would have been a rood screen loft.
In the North aisle are set a North door, the village War Memorial, the organ and a children’s play area. Near to the War Memorial is the ‘Death Penny’ memorial medal sent to the family of George Pick who died in 1917, and is interred in a Commonwealth War Grave in Eaton Cemetery.
The Tower
The massive tower is typically Early English in style being of three stage construction divided by string-coursed (check type) mouldings and reinforced by clasping buttresses at each external corner. The upper part of the belfry stage is decorated with a corbel table composed of small heads, above which is a crenellated parapet with a spout and crocketed pinnacle at each corner. The spouts are all decorative mythical beasts apart from the one on the south- west corner, which is simply formed from a roughly fashioned slab. This apparently originated from the crossroads at nearby Eastwell and probably stood upright as a monolith in prehistoric times.
Large, louvered two-light plate traceried windows pierce each face of the belfry. These are headed with rounded Romanesque arches north and south, and pointed Gothic arches east and west. The primitive plate tracery features either diamond or trefoil apertures.
The spire, usually built of ironstone, is an octagonal structure with single tier, gabled, two-light lucarnes placed on alternating facets. There are small Early English lancet windows serving the ringing chamber to the north and south, and there is a larger lancet window set into the west wall. Internally, the ringing chamber is open to the nave via a triple chamfered Gothic arch set upon polygonal responds. Above this is a rectangular opening and evidence of a former gallery, a feature often thought to have been used by musicians. However, this opening is an architectural feature more commonly associated with Saxon churches, the purpose of which is obscure. The tower is accessed internally via a Gothic arched doorway and a narrow stone stairway leading off the ground floor ringing chamber.
The Porch
The South doorway opens into the long-gabled porch which has stone seating on either side. The church door has three orders of shafts (Early English) with nailhead and dog-tooth decoration (Transitional).
There is a stone niche over the south doorway which would have once housed a figure of St. Denys that probably disappeared during the reformation. The are stone heads on either side of the doorway have for many years been understood as a tonsured monk and a wimple clad nun.
