Great Maplestead

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Finchingfield (Essex)

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Ixworth Thorpe (Suffolk)

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	Dedication : St Giles Simon Jenkins: Excluded Principal Features : Norman Tower; Apsidal Church; Deane Monuments

My decision to choose to write about this little church might have you scratching our head as to how I choose. Caprice is the principal reason, and I make no apology for that! Great Maplestead is well worth a visit, however, and nobody in their right mind is going to visit it without also visiting the round-naved church of Little Maplestead only a mile away. See the two as an indivisible pair.

Remarkably, both Maplesteads have surviving shallow Norman apses. Great Maplestead also has a hefty Norman west tower. Oddly, the bits in between are later. The choir which is between the nave and the apse was rebuilt in the Thirteenth century as evidenced by a couple of lancet windows on the north side. It is odd that the apse was kept but we can be very grateful for that.

In the fourteenth century a south aisle was added with, so it is averred, a south “transept”, although the transept is the same depth as the aisle so it might be more accurately have been described as a chapel. In any event, in the seventeenth century it was extended southwards to make space for the Deane family tombs that are the highlight of the interior and thus became a transept as we might expect to see one.

The north side is completely Victorian apart from the choir wall, as is the south porch.


	The arch between apse and choir is the original Norman. Its underside is adorned with five painted roundels of 1566. Four represent the Evangelists and the fifth is a cross. The chancel arch is fourteenth century and contemporary with the rebuilding of the choir.

Left: The approach to the church from the west on a crisp sunny January morning. The lower parts of the tower are twelfth century Norman. The Victorian north aisle is quite dwarfed but the south transept is itself a hefty edifice. Right: Looking towards the east. The Early English chancel arch is enormous compared to the tiny one that separates it from the apse. To the right, and hardly separated from the south aisle, is the south transept with the Denny monuments.

Left: Looking into the apse with its Norman east window. There are others to north and south. The plain arch has probably been rebuilt at some time. Note the five painted sixteenth century roundels. Centre: Looking into the south transept with what look rather like B&Q cupboards and a picnic table filling the spaces between the Deane monuments to left and right. Right: Two lancet windows sit above each other in the choir. An odd configuration. The painting within the windows spaces look like modern over-painting of something original.

Roundel paintings on the apse arch soffit. The four Evangelists are portrayed in their traditional symbolic form. Left: St Matthew as an angel. Centre: St Mark as a lion. Right: St Luke as a bull.

Left: St Mark as an eagle. Centre: A cross. Right: Detail of a muzzled bear beneath the feet of Sir John Deane (d.1625) whose monument is shown below.

Left: Sir John Deane’s monument is in the east wall of the north transept. Jon was a minor worthy, serving Essex as Sheriff, Lieutenant and MP for the county before his death. For his place in society as a minor gentleman he was a very wealthy man, having benefited from some hefty inheritances. He clutches what seems to be some sort of staff of office, not a sword which is presumably behind his body. There is no suggestion that he wore his fine armour in any kind of warfare! His wife, Anne Drury, outlived him by eight years and she does not appear on this monument but had one erected for her sole benefit (below). The space above the monument shows his two sons and six daughters. It is suggested that he enjoyed the support of Sir Robert Rich, 2nd Earl of Warwick who held the manor at Braintree. If so, this might explain the appearance of a bear at Sir John’s feet, this being the symbol of Warwick. Right: The face of Sir John.


	Left and Right: Sir John Deane’s children above his monument.

Left: The monument of Lady Anne Deane, husband of Sir John, faces his across the transept, Her monument was erected by Sir Drew Drury, her son. It is a startling image of her, representing a big departure from the mediaeval tradition of recumbent figures. Pevsner says it is “macabre” and typical of its sculptor William Wright of Charing Cross. Sir Drew’s effigy is at her feet, also with his feet on a muzzled bear (above). His head rests on a block, his arms crossed. It is an uncomfortable-looking pose. Drew, it seems loved his old mum Her epitaph reads:

Her shape was rare: Her beauty exquisite
Her wytt accurate: Her judgement singular
Her entertainment harty: Her conversation lovely
Her harte merciful: Her hand helpful
Her courses modest: Her discourses wise
Her charity Heavenly: Her amity constant
Her practise holy: Her religion pure
Her vowes lawful: Her meditations divine
Her faith unfaygned: Her hope stable
Her prayers devout: Her devotions diurnall
Her dayes short: Her life everlastingThe

Left: The Perpendicular style font. Centre: The use of red tile made from locally-sourced clay is a feature of Essex churches. It is much more attractive and, one surmises, vastly cheaper than lead that had to be transported all the way from Derbyshire or the Forest of Dean. The rubble facing of the walls attests to Essex’s paucity of quarried stone. The mixture of red tiles and pebble facing produces an attractive effect as this picture of the space between the south porch and the south transept shows. Right: Two Early English lancet windows in the north choir. The upper one, oddly, is framed by timber. Why two windows?


	Left: The view to the west of the interior. Right: Church crawlers are privileged to have an excuse to visit the most beautiful rural corners of England. This is the view from the east end of the church. A recurring joke for me is to hear people moaning about “our overcrowded island”. They really need to get our more! And to leave the main roads.




	Left: This is a mighty west tower. This south side shows a Norman window. You can see how red brick has been seen to repair it as well as to face the west end of the south aisle. Right: The church from the east showing its east window.

			Click Here for Little Maplestead - 1 mile away.