Ashwater Church of St Peter Basics
Listed building grade 1
Regularly open
Address
Church of St Peter
Ashwater
Beaworthy
EX21 5EY
Geographical coordinates
50°44’03.2″N 4°17’14.3″W (enter these in your smartphone navigator)
Devonchurchland says…
Ashwater church is a simply stunning West Devon church very finely restored in the 19th century with a mass of original fittings. It is wondrously skilful fusion of the Medieval with the Victorian.
The tower itself is a beauty, and there are some lovely 15/16th century granite windows and a cracking south doorway, now unused.
Inside, the medieval roof is your man, beautiful foliage roof bosses along with every single rib carefully carved, again with foliage. It is awesome, and the relatively low ceiling increases the power.
The south aisle arcade is a beauty too, alternating different styles as it does, and in the aisle itself is a very good royal coat of arms as well as a finely carved tomb with a couple of effigies. This might or might not be a marriage of different parts.
The glorious pulpit, like the rest of the woodwork, is by the much underrated Devon carver John Northcott from Ashwater itself.
The chancel is one of the best Victorian renovations I have seen in Devon, quiet, modest and yet full of careful colours and quality woodwork. The altar back is very high quality, the Supper at Emmaus on tilework exquisitely married with carefully carved wood to create a three dimensional effect.
The Norman font with its heads and dragons is a cracking piece too, and so much more to see as always.
A place to take your time to enjoy for sure, though to be fair I can say that about every Devon church. This one even more so, for sure.
Outline
PLAN
- Nave
- Chancel
- West tower,
- 6-bay south aisle
- 1 bay to the chancel
- South chapel
- North transept
- North west porch
AGE
- C12 font
- North transept C14 or earlier
- South aisle C14 and C15,
- Tower late C15
- Substantial restoration of the 1880s
BUILT FROM
- Roughly squared stone rubble
- Granite and freestone dressings
- Slate roofs
Exterior
WEST TOWER
- 3 stage
- Unbuttressed
- Battlemented
- Rectangular corner pinnacles
- Obelisk finials crowned with crosses
- Projecting north east stair turret of unusual design
- Bottom stage is rounded to the west
- Rubble masonry of small dimensions
- 2 upper stages are canted to the west
- Top stage rises above the battlementing of the tower proper
- As a battlemented turret with rectangular corner pinnacles
- West face has chamfered west doorway
- Hoodmould and label stops
- Below a 2-light square-headed Perpendicular window
- Hoodmould and label stops
- Belfry openings on all 4 faces
- 2 chamfered round-headed lights with slate louvres
- Small chamfered lancet is at bellringers’ stage
- On the south face
SOUTH AISLE
- 2 straight joints suggest that partial rebuilding in the C19
- When 3 buttresses with set-offs were added
- Shallow-moulded arched priests’ door at east end
- Late C15/early C16
- Circa C12 corbel head inserted above doorway at west end
- Probably reused North West outer doorway from late C15 porch
- Which no longer exists
- Moulded arched granite doorway
- Moulded square-headed architrave
- Carved spandrels and a hoodmould
- Carved label stops.
- C15 4-light granite east window
- Deeply recessed
- Perpendicular Y tracery
- Cusped lights, hoodmoulds and carved label stops
- 3 granite south windows
- More conventional Perpendicular design
- Hoodmoulds and carved labels stops.
- West window of the aisle is similar
NORTH PORCH
- Each side a 3-light square-headed cusped circa late C15/early C16 window
- With hoodmould and label stops.
- Gabled
- C19
- Fish scale slates
- Plain arched outer doorway
- Narrow round-headed chamfered inner doorway
- Plaster barrel roof
CHANCEL
- Fabric appears to be entirely C19.
- Coped east gable has kneelers
- Crowned by a cross
- 3-light Perpendicular east window
- Hoodmould and label stops
- Below a pierced trefoil in the gable
- South wall 1-light trefoil-headed late C19 window
- North side 1 similar window
- Hoodmould and label stops
- 1 window of 2 trefoil-headed lights
- Common hoodmould with label stops
- Rectangular rood loft stair turret has a catslide roof and a slit window
NORTH TRANSEPT
- Coped gable
- 3-light square-headed cusped circa late C15/early C16 east window
- Hoodmould and label stops
- Mullions replaced
- 3-light granite Perpendicular north window
- Hoodmould and label stops probably C19
Interior
VARIOUS
- C19 timber chancel arch
- Springs from a carved moulded rood beam
- Carried on moulded brackets and shafts
- Supported on small corbels
- Rendered walls
- Unmoulded tower arch
- Carried on simple imposts
- Has a relieving arch above
- 1880s tower screen
- Round-headed chamfered doorway to the roof loft stairs
- Appears to have been recut
- Large plaster 1638 Royal Arms fixed to the south wall
- Framed by Corinthian columns
- A moulded plaster cornice at wallplate level
- Arms have been repainted in the late C20
PORCH
- Plank door with large false strap hinges
ROOFS
- Nave a Perpendicular plastered wagon roof
- Unusually wide
- Carved ribs, bosses and wall plates
- Wall plates are largely C19
- Otherwise the carving is original
- Fine shallow foliage bosses of various designs
- Wagon roof to the south aisle
- Similar carving
- Original wallplate on the south side.
- Chancel roof is a C19 boarded ceiled waggon
- Carved ribs, bosses and wall plates
FONT
- Outstanding C12
- Probably Polyphant stone
- Profile heads at the corners of the bowl
- 3 faces of the bowl are carved with foliage
- Framed by a border moulding terminating in beast’s heads
- Of a Scandinavian appearance
- Fourth face contains a fine running animal
- Similar border moulding
- Bowl is on a short octagonal stem
- And chamfered plinth
BENCH ENDS
- Carved rectangular bench ends to the front of the nave and aisle
- Partly C19
- Partly C19 repairs of medieval bench ends
- Some carved with symbols of the Passion
- Benches to the west with panelled ends
- Circa late C18/early C19
ARCADE
- Alternates between:
- C14 Decorated octagonal piers in ashlar masonry
- Moulded C15 Perpendicular granite piers.
- Octagonal piers have:
- Short moulded capitals
- Tall bases of rectangular section.
- Granite piers have:
- Conventional Perpendicular mouldings
- But are constructed in 2 pieces lengthways
- Shafts doubled at east and west
- Pevsner suggests design adopted to give same width as the C14 piers
- Reused when the aisle was rebuilt
- Granite capitals do not match the piers perfectly
- Arches of the arcade equally unusual
- Chancel bay and south side of the nave bays have a double roll moulding
- But inner order on the nave side is chamfered freestone ashlar arch
CHANCEL
- Altar has panels of fleur de lis plate tracery
- Which match the throne.
- The C19 fittings are of a high quality
- C19 tiling
- Fine pair of priests’ stalls
- And timber arcaded altar rail.
- Choir stalls are elaborate
- Carved traceried panels to the ends
- An integral parclose on the south side
- Cusped arcading
- There is a good C17 slate ledger stone fixed to the east wall behind the altar
ALTAR BACK
- Elaborate 1880s
- 5 bays of minutely carved timber tabernacle work
- Flamboyant tracery
- Over a tile painting of the supper at Emmaus
- Timber frame of the reredos linked to the tile painting with trompe l’oeil effects
- Theme of the painting is continued on a tin dado
- Stencil decoration
- Demi-angels running across the east wall
- On either side of the carved traceried hinged riddels
- That frame the reredos
MONUMENT
- Fixed to the south side of the south aisle
- Elaborate circa late C15 Beerstone Monument
- Probably to Thomas Carminow
- Died 1442
- Probably moved from the south chancel chapel.
- Effigies of a knight and lady lie on a chest beneath a canopy
- With a heavily cusped arch
- Principal cusps terminating in angels’ heads
- Chest is decorated with the remains of richly cusped blind quatrefoils
- A quatrefoil frieze crowns the tombs
- Original cresting has been replaced by a circa C17 depressed timber pediment
- Soffit of the canopy is decorated with ribs
- Remains of a gnadenstuhl is carved in a niche at the feet of the effigies
STAINED GLASS
- 2 medieval stained glass heraldic shields in the east window
- Carew impaling Carminow
- Courtenay impaling De Redvers
- 1 shield of monogram
- East window C19 by Beer of Exeter
Other information
Section of wall between the tower and the west wall of the south aisle probably represents the remains of the C14 west wall of the aisle.
Some arcade piers Decorated but church otherwise largely Perpendicular in character although parts of the fabric may be earlier.
The pre C14 building was probably cruciform with a south aisle added in the C14. Parts of the tower masonry may also date from the C14.
In the C15 the south aisle was altered and re-roofed, the nave re-roofed and the tower rebuilt
The nave was refenestrated in the late C15/early C16.
In the 1880s the chancel was extended, rebuilt and re-roofed, the north side rebuilt and the north
transept re-roofed. A porch was added on the north west
Prior to this the main entrance appears to have been at the south west.
The 1880s fittings are of a very high quality.
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