Year-3O3
The Emperor Diocletian unleashes a major persecution on the Christian church.
St. Alban, the first martyr of England is supposed to have been one of those who died. So was St. Margaret of Antioch. She was to become very popular with the crusaders and many English and European churches were named after her at that time. We celebrate her patronal festival every 20th July.
306
Constantine proclaimed Emperor (while at York). He was to establish Christianity as the religion
of the Empire. The earliest evidence of Christianity in England dates from this period.
635
1086
Until the Reformation 1440 Reformation and Civil War 1623
The Shape of the Church 1829
1863
1900-1918
The church today 1968
1971
The Church itself was used in the film 'The Eagle has landed'.
1981 1989
2000
After the 'Dark Ages' Christianity re-established in southern England. St. Birinus baptises
the King of Wessex in the Thames at Dorchester, 30 miles upstream from Mapledurham.
The Domesday Book. Two manors of Mapledurham (not united until 1582) are held by
Norman barons. The mill is recorded. The larger manor may have had its Manor House here.
A church would have stood here by this time. THE FONT with its beautiful Norman decoration is
all that survives of it.
1270-1395
The larger manor held by the Bardolph family, who built
THE PRESENT CHURCH and who added
THE SOUTHERN AISLE as a chantry chapel.
This is the period of the 'Canterbury Tales'. Many Priests
earned their living from the endowrnent of chantry chapels.
Here they would have 'chanted' or prayed for the souls of
their benefactors. As often happened, the right to appoint the
Vicar was handed over (in 1306) to a French Priory, but the
King confiscated this while at war with France (in 1344)
Manor bought by the Blount family whose descendants still live in Mapledurham House
and who retain the south ('Bardolph`) aisle as their private property.
THE TOMB IN THE RAILINGS is of Sir Richard Blount (1564 - 1628), a great grandson of the
original purchaser. He completed the new Tudor Manor House begun by his father which we see today.
Both his father and grandfather were Lieutenants of the Tower of London and were buried there.
Heads on the church side of the tomb have been defaced unlike those on the private side.
1542
Henry VIII creates a new Diocese of Oxford. Until this time we were in the Diocese of Lincoln.
The manner of services would have been changed radically here over the next few years.
The Bible had just been printed in English and Cranmer was soon to produce his first Prayer Book.
We do not know how local people reacted to this, but we do know that Edward VI's commissioners
carried off a gold and a silver chalice and rich vestments from the church.
There would have been some stability between 1575 and 1630. Thomas Matthew was Vicar for all 55 years.
The date of THE OLDEST BELL in the tower, although bells may have been rung before this.
There has been a peal of six bells since at least the restoration (1660).
The Civil War touched Mapledurham when the Manor House was sacked, but there was no change
of Vicar. William Day stayed for 47 years from 1637 to 1684.
1722
A little imagination is needed to picture the church in the 18th century. This is the period of the
Methodist revival and many Anglican churches would have been altered to look more
like 'Preaching Houses'. In this year a gallery was erected. In 1737 the walls were whitewashed
and boards were erected with the Lord's Prayer, the Creed, the Ten Commandments and a list
of benefactors. There were large 'box` pews, and a pulpit with three tiers (or 'decks`) one each for
the Clerk, the Minister and for the Sermon.
The Vicar (John Sumner, later Archbishop of Canterbury) is persuaded to become Bishop
of Chester so that the King (William IV) could install one of his illegitimate children
(Lord Augustus Fitz-Clarence) in his place.
The King was to contribute to the founding of the Church School in 1830 and to give
THE CLOCK BEARING HIS INITIALS in 1832.
This is the period of Trollope's novels.
Lord Augustus challenged unsuccessfully the rights of the Lord of the Manor to the Bardolph Aisle,
but was granted the right to fees for burials there.
The church is given its present appearance in a drastic restoration by William Butterfield
(the architect of Keble College, Oxford). This was paid for by the Vicar Edward Coleridge
(a nephew of the poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge).
Butterfield swept away all the existing furnishings,
including the gallery, and raised THE TOWER by 24 feet. He illuminated THE CHANCEL ROOF,
added a false pitched roof above it, and put in a marble reredos behind the altar (now hidden by a curtain).
He also created THE ILLUSION OF A NORTH AISLE with false wooden pillars.
You can see this clearly if you look up at the pitch of the roof from inside the north aisle
and from outside the church.
Butterfield disposed of all earlier memorials, although those in the private aisle survive.
From this period some are linked with the Rose family of nearby Hardwick House.
THE WINDOW IN THE NORTH AISLE is in memory of three sons of Sir Charles and Lady Rose.
She had carved a huge monument to them, since removed to the belfry.
SIR CHARLES GRAVE, the middle of three crosses west of the tower, has an interesting inscription.
THE MEMORIAL BY THE PULPIT is to a Rector of Purley (opposite Mapledurham on the Thames)
who was swept over the weir and drowned returning from taking a service here.
A BOOK BY THE FONT records the names of all those from the Parish who served in the 1914-18 war.
Here there is a memorial to those of them who died, and here the British Legion Flag is laid up.
The memorial to those who died in the 1939-45 war is provided by THE CHURCHYARD GATES.
During the century Reading has grown across the medieval parish boundary in the east.
As a result there came to be 2500 people living in the parish, although no more than 50 lived
in the village itself. In this year the last Vicar left the parish.
Mapledurham was then served by one of the Assistant Curates from the neighbouring parish of Caversham.
The Church School is closed after 143 years and its
BELL AND FOUNDATION STONE were placed in the Porch. It had gradually ceased to take
children up to 14 years old and had become a Primary and then an Infant School.
Children still go to the Church of England Primary School in the neighbouring parish of Kidmore End.
A new parish of 'Caversham and Mapledurham' is created by an Order of H.M. the Queen in Council.
The patronage is shared between Eton and Christ Church, Oxford (patrons of the old Caversham
parish since the Reformation).
The four churches in Caversham of St. Andrew, St. Barnabas, St. John the Baptist and
Caversham Park Village are granted the status of parishes leaving the two parish churches of St. Peter,
Caversham and St. Margaret, Mapledurham in one combined benefice.
Today as many people as ever worship here week by week. Please pray for those who worship
here and for yourselves remembering all those who have visited this place over the last century and before.
