St Mary's Church, Lower Swell

St Mary's Church stands in Lower Swell, a village on the B4068 a mile west of Stow-on-the-Wold. It is two churches side by side: the nave and chancel of the twelfth century, kept as the south aisle and chapel, and a much larger church added in 1852. The Norman parts keep a doorway carved with a Tree of Life and a chancel arch ringed with rare carvings. It is listed Grade II*.

History

The first church was built in the early or middle twelfth century: a nave and a slightly narrower chancel. It was altered in the fifteenth century, when the porch was added, and again in about 1683.

The new church of 1852

In 1852, on the initiative of the vicar, David Royce, the architects J C Buckler and Son added a north aisle in the Early English style, larger than the old nave. In 1870 a new chancel followed, and the new aisle became the nave, while the old nave and chancel became a south aisle and a chapel. That is why the Norman church survives almost whole, beside rather than inside the Victorian one.

Paintings, glass and bells

In 1883 and 1884 Clayton and Bell filled the new chancel with a scheme of wall paintings and glass telling the story of the Passion; they made the other windows too between 1866 and 1884, except the east window of the old chancel, of 1841. M H Medland rebuilt the bellcote on the west gable in 1901, to mark David Royce's fifty years as vicar, when two new bells joined one of 1683, and in 1925 F E Howard made the chancel screen and the pulpit.

What to see

The Norman church is the reason to come, above all its two carved features.

• The doorway at the west end of the old nave, now the south aisle, under its fifteenth-century porch: round-headed, with a tympanum of ten closely wedged stones carved with a Tree of Life and a dove pecking at its fruit, apparently never finished
• The old chancel arch, on three pairs of nook-shafts whose capitals carry primitive figure carving, its outermost order set with a band of 26 symbolic carvings of people and animals, which the Victoria County History thought unique
• On the south wall of the old chancel, a small round-headed Norman window, a later low-side window and a corbel table with carved heads; more of the Norman corbel table is reused on the north wall of the new chancel
• Clayton and Bell's Passion scheme of paintings and glass in the chancel of 1870
• In the churchyard, about 14m south-west of the church, the base of a medieval cross, listed in its own right

Visiting

The church does not publish opening times. It is used as a festival church for occasional services and by the village school, and the benefice's regular Sunday services are held at St Edward's in Stow. It may be locked at other times, so check with the benefice of Stow, Condicote and the Swells before a special journey. The churchyard and the outside, with the Norman window and corbel table, can be seen at any time.

Getting there

The church is in Lower Swell, on the B4068 a mile west of Stow. The benefice notes only limited parking in the road by the church, so it is easier to park in Stow, at the free Fosseway car park (GL54 1BX) or the Maugersbury Road car park (GL54 1HH, from £4.40 for two hours, no cash), and walk. On foot, the Stow and Lower Swell walk comes up Mill Lane to the green and takes the footpath through the churchyard, 3.6 miles (5.8km) round from Back Walls in Stow. Pulhams bus 801 serves Stow about hourly every day, with a shorter day on Sundays; no bus stops in Lower Swell.

Nearby

On the green nearby is the village war memorial, by Sir Edwin Lutyens, and on the road to Stow the Pineapple Spa of 1807. In Stow are St Edward's Church and tea at the Old Bakery Tearoom. For another church where the Victorians built new rather than over the old, see St Nicholas at Lower Oddington, and a few miles south-west St Peter's at Upper Slaughter is another old church in the hills round Stow.