St Mary, Chithurst

Of the family of churches on the banks of the River Rother, Chithurst church is the poor one. As a result, it appears today much as it was built at the time of the Conquest.

Its position is a curious mixture of remoteness and proximity. Chithurst itself is only a small huddle of houses and there are five other churches within three miles, so few people have cared for this humble building over the millenium that it has stood on its curious mound next to the bridge over the river.

The church is a typical layout with a nave and chancel separated by a narrow arch, pressed down at the top as though collapsing under the weight of the roof.

The main alterations were made in the 13^th century to bring in more light, including an east window with two lights and a cusped lancet in the north wall.

In the south wall of the nave, a large pointed window with tracery was punched into the centre, but in Victorian times it was moved to the east and a matching copy inserted to the west. Intriguingly, the mason who made the copy could not resist sexing it up a little with fancier mouldings.

The only other alterations were the addition of a charming half-timbered porch and a little bellcote. Buttresses were added and then all but one removed. A circular window, recycled from Iping church, was inserted into the west wall and then taken out again for structural reasons. The ceilings were plastered and then unplastered. Chithurst church seems to actively resist alteration.

Sussex Communion Rails

Communion rails are a surprisingly recent innovation, probably dating only as far as late medieval times when people began to kneel to receive the bread and wine instead of standing up. They may have also been intended to keep animals out of the sanctuary.
The earliest altar rails date from the 16th century, and the church at West Wittering (above) has a splendid set dating from that time.

By the reign of James I, altar rails had become fairly standard and a fine set from that period survives at Didling church (left). Short, fat balusters support a deep rail carved with semicircles, as though the designer wanted an aqueduct but couldn't find anyone capable of carving the arches.

As with almost all aspects of church furnishing, communion rails became higly controversial in the run-up to the Civil War. Charles I's Archbishop of Canterbury, William Laud, decreed that all altars should be made of stone and surrounded by rails to prevent profane use, which was regarded as close to popery by the Puritans.
Most of Laud's stone altars were destroyed in the Commonwealth, and were not, by and large, brought back at the Restoration but replaced with wooden tables. But the rails were kept – they were just too convenient for resting your elbows on when waiting for the bread and wine. 

In the 18th century communion rails became more slender and elegant, often with balusters turned in a lovely barleytwist shape, like the lovely rails at Kirdford (right). 

The Victorians seem to have regarded the balusters as looking too much like a fence for excluding the laity from the abode of God, and began to introduce communion rails on metal posts that could be spaced much more widely. 

In the Catholic church, altar rails became controversial again after the Second Vatican Council. Many were removed, to the consternation of some congregations. The Catholic church has since back-pedalled somewhat, allowing rails to be kept if they are of historic significance. 

The latest trend in church design is the Demountable Sanctuary Stage, a structure for multi-use spaces using technology developed for temporary theatres. The raised altar can be installed quickly and easily, with the communion rail slotting into holes in the front.

All Saints, East Dean

The basic shape of East Dean church is unaltered from the time of its construction between the middle of the 12^th century to the first part of the 13^th. The cross shape with the tower at the middle is still there, with the impressive south door with its columns and multiple arches.

A north aisle was added in the 14^th century and later removed, leaving only the traces of an arch visible in the outside wall. A wooden spire came and went.

The tower arches were beefed up with segmental curves at some point, and it is said the tops of the original medieval pointed arches are still visible above the plaster ceiling in the crossing.

The basic plan even survived the Victorians, who in 1870 brought in not one but two architects. The rector, who was responsible for the chancel, employed the nationally-known Ewan Christian, but the parishioners, who had to pay for the rest, got John Marshall, a local builder who was presumably much cheaper. Fortunately, although much of the stonework was replaced or sharpened up, they did not interfere too much.

A pair of lovely 18^th century gravestones in the churchyard nicely illustrate two contrasting approaches to memorialising death. One is covered with symbols of mortality – a skull, a funerary urn and what looks like a bell. The other has symbols of the afterlife – the rays of God's glory, two cherubs and bunches of grapes.

It would be lovely to know if the first was erected to the gloomy old pessimist of the village, and the other to the local sunny optimist.

Monumental Brasses

Margaret Camoys, Trotton

The craft of engraving a memorial into a sheet of brass and letting it into a stone slab began in the early 13th century and reached its zenith in the 14th, when the classic brasses of knights in armour and ladies in wimples were produced.

Lord and Lady Camoys, Trotton

The brass to Margaret Camoys in Trotton church is exactly what we think a brass should look like. She died in 1310 and her memorial is the first full-size brass, and the first to a woman. Wearing a wimple and flowing garments, her feet rest on a dog. Originally, enamelled shields were set on her dress. The portrait is simple, bold and moving.

Close by is a huge and superb brass to Lord and Lady Camoys, dating from a century later, showing the couple rather charmingly holding hands.

John Wantele,
Amberley

Few brasses were as large as the Camoys'. John Wantele in Amberley, for example, died in 1424, and his brass is only a couple of feet tall. It shows him in armour and surcoat, his sword by his side and his dog beneath his feet. It still has traces of the enamel that originally picked out his coat of arms.

In medieval times memorial brasses were a surprisingly large industry, dominated by several workshops in London. All the metal, an alloy of copper and zinc, was imported from Germany, which had the monopoly, so it was often referred to as latten (old German for plate) or cullen (from Cologne).

Warminghurst

In the 16th century, brasses were taken up by the middle classes. The plate got thinner and the engraving got shallower and fussier. Whole families are often portrayed, the husband and all the sons lined up on one side and the wife and daughters on the other – there is an excellent example at Warminghurst.

Henry Wilsha, Storrington

The 1591 brass to Henry Wilsha, vicar of Storrington shows him in academic dress, but the lines are barely visible after centuries of Brasso. Shortly thereafter, brasses ceased to be made until a remarkable revival in Victorian times. Arundel church even has a fine brass to the Duke of Norfolk in his Garter robes, made in 1979.

St George, Trotton

Outside, Trotton's church is a plain 14^th century box with an earlier tower, but inside it is bursting with treasures, notably a tremendous mural on the west wall, an inspiration for the good and a warning for the bad.

It was painted in the late 14^th century, possibly funded by a bequest of thirty sheep by Margaret Camoys, whose memorial brass is in church's central aisle.

At the top stands Christ in Judgement, flanked by angels. Below him is Moses, holding the tablets with the commandments, making clear the rules for a godly life.

But the most prominent parts of the composition are the giant figures on either side of the prophet, Spiritual Man on the right and Carnal Man on the left. Spiritual Man is surrounded by little scenes of the seven virtues, but Carnal Man is girt with dragons about to swallow figures indulging in the seven deadly sins.

Spiritual Man is a serious, bearded chap wearing a cowl and holding his hands in prayer. Scrolls proclain his possession of the three cardinal virtues, Spes (Hope), Caritas (Charity) and Fides (Faith).

The seven virtues are taken mainly from the Beatitudes, and start at the top with Clothing the Naked – a woman helps a man in a loincloth into a robe. Tending the Sick is a rather touching scene of group round a bed, seen through a hole in the wall of a timber medieval house.

Inevitably, Carnal Man is much more vigorous and memorable. He is naked, and the dragons' tails point to the parts of his body that cause the particular sin. Gluttony, for example, comes from the mouth and shows an enthusiastic toper upending a bottle, with a plate of food behind him. Envy comes from the head, and Sloth from the left foot.

You are now wondering where Lust (pictured as a naked couple embracing) is based, and indeed the dragon's tail points to the obvious place. According to Professor Tristram, who uncovered the painting in 1902, Carnal Man was egregiously lusting when he was originally painted, though it is no longer visible. Whether the area concerned has faded since then, or was tidied up by censorious churchwardens is not known. It is unfortunate but perhaps appropriate that Carnal Man has decayed a lot more that Spiritual Man over the centuries.

The mural at Trotton represents the last gasp for wall painting. The early work such as Hardham and West Chiltington are powerful and pictorial, where Trotton is abstract and now assumes that some parishioners at least could read. It would not be long before images would be swept away and replaced by the purer message of the bible on the lectern and the commandment boards on the walls.

St Mary the Virgin, Upwaltham

The church at Upwaltham is an amazing survival, almost unaltered from when it was built in the 12^th century.

Its location away from any big settlement meant that there was never pressure to extend it or money to restore it, but its position close to the Chichester to Petworth road meant that it never fell into disuse and decay as many more remote churches did.

It was a jolly close run thing, though. From 1833 to '51 the rector of Upwaltham and neighbouring East Lavington was the dynamic high churchman Henry Manning, later one of Britain's most high profile converts to Catholicism, second Archbishop of Westminster and a cardinal. He had East Lavington church so brutally restored and extended barely any original features survive today.

Luckily, he never got round to 'beautifying' Upwaltham. Perhaps he just liked it the way it was – in in later life he described the church and its downland setting as "only less beautiful then heaven."

Standing alone, halfway up the hill, the church is a simple rectangle with an apsidal chancel. Unusually, there is no east window. Instead, there are windows on either side. The chancel arch is 13^th century (the 12^th century arch would have been considerably narrower).

The beams of the kingpost roof may also be original, another unusual survival given the dangers of rot and fire over the centuries.

In the chancel the piscina or basin for washing the communion vessels is ornately carved with spirals called volutes. It is possible that it came from Chichester Cathedral.

St James, Selham

We tend to assume that architecture changed from Anglo-Saxon to Norman the instant King Harold was killed at Hastings, but in fact the transition had already started under Edward the Confessor and would not be complete until decades after the Conquest.

Edward, who was half Norman, had adopted the Romanesque style but it only became official when William began an enormous building programme designed to overwhelm the population with a sense of the power and wealth of their new overlords. While the designers imposed the new style, much of the actual work was done by Saxon masons who were either unwilling or unable to adapt.
The period has become known as the Saxo-Norman overlap, and you can see the results perfectly at Selham's lovely little church.
The thin walls and tall, narrow proportions of the nave and chancel are typically Saxon, as is the tall, thin north doorway.
But the walls are laid in herringbone courses with a rubble core, and the cornerstones are proper quoins instead of the long-and-short work characteristic of the Saxons.
Look at the chancel arch, however, and it gets really confusing.
The arch seems to be Norman, and the capital on the north side has carved volutes that are typically Romanesque.
The capital on the south side is pure Saxon, however, carved with writhing snakes grasping their own tails in their mouths, a symbol of eternity.
The slabs of stone on top the capitals, called abaci, are similarly disparate, with Saxon plaiting on the north and stylised foliage that could be either Saxon or Norman on the south.
The top stones on which the ends of the arch rest are called imposts. The one on the north has a sophisticated moulding on the inside face, leading one authority to claim it as a Roman fragment, but is carved on the nave side with stylised foliage. The impost on the other side is carved with the head of a beast, a Viking symbol denoting the exclusion of evil from the sacred space of the chancel.
It is difficult to believe that all these crudely-carved components were carved by the same hand. Was one side done by a Norman and the other by his Saxon underling? It is also possible that a Norman mason assembled the arch from recycled Saxon stones, filling in the gaps with his own work.
Whatever the process, the result is a memorable work of art.