A Brief Description of St. Stephen’s, Lympne 1862

 

“A curious church, adjacent to the interesting castellated mansion of the Archdeacons, which is a good domestic specimen of the fifteenth century. The church is of  much earlier date, having both Norman and Early English work, but chiefly the latter. It consists of nave with north aisles, chancel, and massive tower situated between the chancel and nave; also a porch on the north, on which side is the public approach to the church, which, on the south, is very near to the declivity of the hill overlooking the marsh. The walls are of coarse masonry, with flints and stone intermixed. There is a tiled roof of high pitch to the aisle; the chancel has a moulded parapet. There are no buttresses on the north, save one flat one near the west end; and the aisle has lancet windows of different sizes.

 

On The south of the nave, the windows, originally Perpendicular, have been mutilated. The west wall of The nave has been rebuilt, too soon and not well. It is very near to the wall of the castle. The nave has, on the north,two rude pointed Early English arches opening to the aisle, without mouldings, on a square pier having an impost, and the angles chamfered. The roof of the nave is flat pitched and Perpendicular. The aisle is carried along The tower ; but the portion corresponding with the latter is divided off for a vestry. The roof of the aisle is a well preserved one, with tie-beams and king-posts ; it has at its east end two lancets, and in the wall is a sepulchral arch under a window, the inner member slightly ogeed and foliated. There are some stone brackets internally against the tower walls above the west arch. The north porch is plain ; over the door is the date 1708. The tower is plain and rude, and has an unfinished appearance, being without parapet. On each side of it are two rude semi-Norman belfry windows, and there are flat buttresses. The tower opens to the nave internally by a rude pointed arch like those of the arcade, opened in a large mass of plain wall, above this arch are seen two rude windows opening into the nave.

 

The tower has a large pointed arch on The north, opening to the aisle, much resembling the western arch and those in the nave. The eastern arch opening to the chancel is semi-circular, rude, and without mouldings; but the impost is sculptured with starry ornament. On each side of this arch is a smaller pointed one of hagioscopic character, as frequently seen both in Kent and Sussex, and elsewhere: Pinvin, and Wyre-Piddle, Worcester ; Little Shelford, Cambridge; Coombes, Sussex.

 

The chancel is very long, and externally has strong buttresses. It is not pewed, but has some modern wainscoting, and a poor modern roof of flat pitch. The east window has three lancets, but the central one is closed up by an ugly modern tablet on which is the decalogue. There are single lancets north and south, and those in the north-west and south-west, now closed, have a lychnoscopic look. The fittings are mean, and need improvement. The font is modern. There is a slab with a flory cross. There are five bells. The churchyard is very extensive, lint all on the north side”.

 

Copied from “The Churches of Kent” Sir Stephen R. Glynne.

Published 1877.