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Monument Types

• CHURCH (Early Medieval to Modern - 1101 AD to 2050 AD)

Summary

Pevsner says the church has a c.1160 north arcade, c.1180 chancel arch responds and was extended in the C14th. It has a perpendicular tower. The C16th aisles have been demolished.

Additional Information

Listed building description:
Church. C12-C13 and C15, much restored 1862/3, including new roof and aisles. Coursed, squared stone and rubble stone and stone dressings. Welsh slate roof with stone-coped gables. Buttresses, some with set-offs. West tower, nave, aisles, chancel, and north chancel porch. C15 tower of 2 stages, with west buttresses, west window, blocked south arch and blocked window within. South-west staircase has west loopholes and projects to south. Four 2-light bell openings, west with later transom. Battlements and small, low, recessed, leaded spirelet with weathervane. Blocked, double chamfered nave arch with door. Late Norman 2 bay north arcade, carefully rebuilt, 1862. Arches with roll and zig-zag mouldings. Round pier with capitals and responds, with lobed frieze to capitals. 2 bay south arcade, with double chamfered arches on octagonal pier. Two 2-light dormers to Cl9 roof of 2 bays, and 1/2 bay at either end. Curved braces to collars. North aisle has windows with plate tracery, one with fragments of medieval glass. Many-moulded chancel arch, also rebuilt. Chancel has two windows to north and south, both to east flat-topped. East window of 1862 with Decorated tracery. Cl9 stained glass. Gabled porch to vestry, probably of 1862, with flat-topped doorway. Window with fragments of medieval stained glass. Chancel roof similar to nave. Chancel also has small north single-light, north doorway, and south piscina. South aisle has single-light windows to west and east, and flat-topped 3-light to south. Many-moulded south doorway with a shaft either side. To either side, a medieval carved stone lion couchant on plinth. Both aisles rebuilt 1862/3 after being pulled down late C16. C15 font. Pevsner, and White's 'Leicestershire and Rutland', 1877.

In 2002 the church was added to English Heritage's Buildings at Risk Survey as Level 4 (6 being highest risk).

Project Gargoyle survey work in 2011 recorded a small 12th century carving in the chancel arch, together with two free-standing lions by the church porch (Pevsner suggests they are pre-Reformation) and a small number of label stops which may be 13th or 14th century, or may be from the 19th century restoration.

<1> Pevsner N, 1984, The Buildings of England Leicestershire and Rutland, p72 (Bibliographic reference). SLE4.

"The N arcade was reconstructed in 1862 with the old materials. It is still splendid to look at. Two bays, a strong round pier with a square abacus, capitals to the pier and responds with a kind of lobed frieze or fringe, decorated to nave and arch openings, undecorated to the aisle. Arches with a big demi-roll, a fine roll towards the nave, and copious zigzag in the soffit and on the face (different detail on each arch). Hoodmould with a raw kind of nailhead motif. All this is clearly late Norman, and not yet Transitional - say of c.1160. The chancel arch responds are a little later, with large, broad, ribbed upright leaves and chamfered abaci. That looks c.1180. The arch itself is of 1862.
"The Norman church was extended W in the C14 by one bay and a S arcade with standard details added. Insufficient land W of this new work meant that the Perpendicular tower was built within the first bay of the nave. The blocked aisle bays are visible externally. Until the C16, when the aisles were demolished, the tower was connected to them by a small arch (N) and an opening under a large lintel (S), both now blocked. W Millican rebuilt the aisles in 1862 as part of his extensive restoration. His are the two pretty wooden dormers, the fittings, and the roofs with their jagged arch-braces. - SCULPTURE. Outside the S porch two stone lions couchant on plinths, possibly associated with a former porch of 1594. - STAINED GLASS. Some C14 canopy work in the vestry. - C15 fragments in the N aisle."

<2> Leicestershire Archaeological and Historical Society, 1870, Transactions of the Leicestershire Archaeological and Historical Society, Volume 2, Vol 2 (1870), p173-4, p256 (Journal). SLE4983.

Sources

Associated Finds

None recorded

Designations

• Listed Building (II*) 1061661: CHURCH OF ST. PETER
• Conservation Area: Allexton

Images

No image caption available © Leicestershire County Council	Church tower, St Peter's Church, Allexton © Leicestershire County Council
South elevation, St Peter's Church, Allexton © Leicestershire County Council	Northeast corner, St Peter's Church, Allexton © Leicestershire County Council
Niche, St Peter's Church, Allexton © Leicestershire County Council	Chancel arch, St Peter's Church, Allexton © Leicestershire County Council
Reconstructed Norman arches, St Peter's Church, Allexton © Leicestershire County Council	Label stop, St Peter's Church, Allexton © Leicestershire County Council
Stone lion, St Peter's Church, Allexton © Leicestershire County Council	Stone lion, St Peter's Church, Allexton © Leicestershire County Council
Label stop, St Peter's Church, Allexton © Leicestershire County Council

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