St Peter ad Vincula

St Peter's church is one of the finest examples of Early English architecture in existence, the only exceptions to that period being the reset north porch entrance of circa 1200, with dogtooth mouldings but still with a round arch, the transitional north doorway, the two renewed south aisle windows of circa 1300 with intersecting tracery and the 14th century tower at the west end with its battlemented parapet and crocketed finials. The tower parapet and buttresses date from the15th to 16th century. The most striking features are the unusual round windows of the nave clerestory which alternate with short lancets. Glazing is mostly of white (clear) glass diamond quarries but the lancet windows in the chancel have a greater quantity of coloured glass of a yellow tint so that whenever the daylight is good, it gives the impression that the sun is streaming in. A low lancet window at the west end of the nave, affording a view of the church interior, is believed to be a squint through which plague victims could observe services.

Walls are built from coursed ashlar of varying heights and split faces to areas of coursed or quite random stone. The stone is mostly a very curious fossil rich stone which may be from the same beds as the local iron ore. The chancel arch at Bottesford, is in an unusual position, as it divides the chancel and transept on one side from the nave on the other. The nave arcading is of the true Early English type, but the pillars on both sides don’t match, those on the south side being ornamented while the others are plain. The chancel houses three sedilia, a double recess containing a piscina and credence and two double aumbrys. 

One of the oldest artefacts is a bronze Sanctus bell mentioned in the 1553 inventory of church goods and walled up to prevent its removal by Queen Elizabeth 1st’s commissioners who went out into every diocese after the short reign of the Roman Catholic Queen Mary to list all ‘popish’ practices. The bell was only rediscovered in 1870.