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Architectural
Development of
St. Michael's Church at
Axmouth in Devon
by Roger Johnson
A X
M O U T H
A Tour of
Architectural Features
Given the
known antiquity and continuity of
habitation in the area surrounding
Axmouth, the present parish church may
well have been constructed upon the ruins
of an earlier edifice. There are
pre-Domesday references to a Saxon church
at Axmouth but, probably built of wood
and thatch, there are no remains extant.
The only clue to a pre conquest structure
is that the chancel is at an angle nearer
to 120 degrees than a right angle with
the transept on the south side. This may
have been dictated by the presence of an
ancient set of foundations. The church
comprises an encouragingly steep slate
roof, a west tower, a nave, a south
aisle, a chancel, and a transept. Its
construction is of a mixture of trap
stone -or a close balsitic approximation
- and flint, externally. The flint is
generally too small to warrant the
appellation 'chert', in my opinion. The
only exception is a 19th century chimney
constructed of compacted calcium
carbonate -possibly Beer stone - appended
to the vestry on the north wall. The
internal construction, including the
windows and the Norman door appear to be
made of Limestone, very probably from the
Beer quarries, as Axmouth was the main
port of dispatch for consignments of
stone from that source. Its close
proximity to the harbour suggests a
possible source of building stone: that
of ballast from ships returning empty, or
a stock pile of stones needed by those
which were to set sail unladen. The
former would explain the use of trap
stone, commonly mined further west in the
Exeter/Totnes area, Loaded as ballast at
Topsham, it could be a cargo of building
stone by the time it reached Axmouth.
Conversely, the local shingle bank, that
was ultimately to prove the undoing of
Axmouth, could double as a source of
ballast and a readily available source of
large flints. The ratio of flint to trap
stone is not uniform. The north and east
walls have only an occasional flint in
them, whereas the south and west walls
contain a much higher proportion. Indeed,
the south wall of the tower is
predominantly flint and would not look
out of place in a coastal Sussex church.
It may be that this merely reflects what
was lying around when they built the
place, but, a possible explanation seemed
to me to be that those walls, exposed to
the rain bearing prevailing winds from
the Southwest, may have been built of
flint to present a more robust surface to
the elements. The minuscule holes in a
basaltic rock might absorb water more
easily than the featureless flint and so
be more vulnerable to erosion by ice.
The west
tower has four twin lancet belfry windows
with simple indented tracery- one on each
wall. The main west window, of similar
design and dating from the late 15th
century, is glazed with geometric tinted
glass. Baffles have been added to the
former in recent years to direct the
sound of the peal of three bells which
are now chimed rather than rung to reduce
the strain on the building. The guide
places the tower in the perpendicular
period c. 1500, but the simplicity of the
decoration might point to an earlier
date, c. 1150 for the belfry windows, and
to their possible removal from a Norman
tower on the south side of the eastern
end of the church to their present site.
The extant evidence for the earlier
existence of an eastern tower is the
presence of Norman corbels on the outside
of the front, right wall of the chancel.
The tower is adorned at its four corners
by four grotesques. These are very badly
weathered and may well be of limestone
construction. It's access is via a spiral
staircase running up the north east side
and protruding from the cuboidal shape as
a substantial segment of a cylinder.
Inside the musicians gallery has been
removed and the area has been screened
off for use as a vestry for the choir
since 1973. The nave, built to a Norman
plan upon Norman foundations, has a wagon
ceiling. The two windows on its north
side were originally perpendicular, but
were rebuilt in Victorian times. The
stained glass in them is 19th century and
memorial in subject. On this side can be
found the banal Victorian font, the
original having been lost.
Half way
up the church lies the magnificently
preserved Norman doorway - c.1150. Until
1887, the old porch was scaled off and
used as a vestry. When the north side of
the transept suffered a similar fate,
doubling as an organ loft, the porch was
reopened and the north door exposed in
its nearly pristine beauty. It is flanked
by two colonettes, one with elementary
upright volutes, the other scalloped. It
is ornamented with zigzagged
crenellations, and a much later
inscription in the tympanum - 1698. The
porch ceiling is of a ribbed wooden
construction with a number of foliate
bosses. At the eastern extremity of the
nave, on the north side, is a Victorian
wooden pulpit and a small, blocked up
door that used to lead to the rood. The
nave terminates in a large, Romanesque,
chancel arch. Attached to the south side
of this arch is a flamboyant
commemorative plaque. Carved in marble,
flanked by angels bearing golden post
horns, and dated 1746 and 1749
respectively, James Hallett and his good
lady wife lie interred with a minimum of
fuss and in the best possible taste.
Other memorials to the Halletts can be
found throughout the church, particularly
in the form of black stone slabs in the
floor of the south aisle. This family,
resident at the neighbouring Stedcombe
House, held the presentation at the
church from 1709 to 1874. On the south
side of the nave runs the south aisle.
This was built either with the Norman
church or soon afterwards. By 1300, the
late Norman round pillars began to lean
outwards. They were restored at that date
by the introduction of pointed arches for
the arcades and semi-circular arches
across the aisle, supported by
strengthened walls and external
buttresses. The windows on the south
aisle are of rural scenes rendered in
stained glass in the 19th century. Each
of the charming subjects is augmented by
a biblical text. The windows on the south
wall are of double lancet form, with
indented tracery. They are made of
limestone which appears exceptionally
well preserved for early English or
perpendicular windows. This is because
they are Tudor windows in the earlier
style.
Beyond the
chancel arch lie the chancel and the
Bindon Chapel or chantry. This last is an
area projecting to the east of the main
chancel comprising about one quarter of
its total area A triangular squint in the
south side of the arch gives much of the
nave a clear view of the perpendicular
east window of the Bindon Chapel which,
almost certainly, was the site of an
important subsidiary altar when the
church was built. This could have been
removed for iconoclastic reasons at the
dissolution of the monasteries, or for
Xenophobic ones when Henry V included the
priory at Loders in his expulsion of
foreign orders. In the southwest corner,
embedded in the wall, is a memorial
tablet to two of the Erles - Dame Anne
(d.1653) and her son Thomas (d.1630).
This family preceded the Halletts: and
succeeded the Order of Our Lady Of Syon
as being the holders of the presentation.
To the east of the south facing
seventeenth century window stands an
early English piscina, thus reinforcing
the likelihood of an altar upon which the
host was offered. The main altar is
modern (1973) as is the largely plain
glass in the windows with only the
shields of St Peter and St Michael in the
east window and a small copy of the
figures on the piers in the south window.
On the Norman wall behind the altar some
non representational mediaeval paint work
in black has been exposed. At the extreme
north eastern corner of the chancel there
is an effigy lying west to east, and set
into a cusped niche in the wall. It is
reputed to be of Roger Hariel, a vicar
and an abbot of Loders. He took up office
in 1320/21 and resigned some four years
later. This would coincide nicely with
the reconstruction of the south aisle and
the pillars supporting it. The effigy's
arch sports two heads, a male at the
western end and a female at the eastern.
Its feet rest upon the crouching figure
of a lion. This may well be a symbol of
the hope of resurrection. A lion is
supposed to lick newly born cubs, and, by
so doing, raise them from a state of
apparent lifelessness.
Behind the
choir stalls on the north side lies the
vestry. Until 1889 it was merely part of
the chancel. In the restoration of that
date the new vestry was constructed from
the early English walls and door to the
north of the cancel and a Victorian
extension. The old vestry was reopened
and resumed its original function as the
main porch. A solid fuel stove was
installed together with the organ from
Stedcombe house. The pews throughout the
church are of recent manufacture. The
last box pews were removed in 1953.
The church
lies in a churchyard of about one acre.
It has seven yews and a number of old
monuments, the earliest decipherable one
being 1721. Its north wall runs along the
main Seaton road.
No link
can be made between the Iron Age fort at
Hawksdown and Axmouth Church's dedication
to St Michael, as there is no evidence of
a sentinel role whereby a pagan shrine
on, or adjacent to the site, was
supplanted and guarded by the present
Christian edifice. There is no unusual
proliferation of anti demonic devices.
Indeed the seven yews and four gargoyles,
which are the only supposedly talismanic
features on view, represent a below
average prophylactic presence. Hoskins,
in his "Devon," praised the
church as being a virtually complete
example of every style from the Norman to
the present day; but neither he, nor
Pevsner, did justice to the many points
of interest to be found in this
fascinating old Devon Church.
Axmouth
Church Medieval Wall Paintings
Axmouth
Church History
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Bio: Roger Johnson is a retired School
Master who lives in Lympstone in Devon.
He has studied several areas of Devon's
fascinating past, and is particularly
captivated by the more contraversial
areas of British History.
The
Lympstone Society
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