Medieval Churches of Northamptonshire
The Evolution of Religious Space, 800–1550
Dr Paul S Barnwell
English Heritage
37 Tanner Row
York YO1 6WP
paul.barnwell@english-heritage.org.uk
Background
The Medieval Churches of Northamptonshire project, was begun in the 1980s
by the former Royal Commission on the Historical Monuments of England.
During that period, the techniques of non-invasive structural analysis were
applied to the 300 pre-Reformation parish churches, parochial chapels and
chapels of ease in the post-1974 county, to create the first systematically
collected corpus of such analysis relating to a particular part of the England.
The resulting records, which will ultimately be deposited in the National
Monuments Record, form the basis for an analysis of the patterns of evolution
of church buildings in an area which, in the middle ages, was neither
sufficiently wealthy for earlier buildings to be replaced wholesale, nor so poor
that early buildings remain unaltered. The result is that almost every surviving
pre-Reformation place of worship has a long evolutionary development, and
that chronological patterns of change can be established.
Aims of the Project
The aim of the project is to produce a book which will not only identify and
describe the patterns which can be traced, but also seek to explain them in
terms of the evolution of the religion and the Church in medieval England.
While much of the analysis relates to the functions for which space was
required, a second stand is to try to re-create something of the visual,
religious and emotional experience of the layfolk who worshiped in the
buildings at different stages in their evolution. This will draw upon the history
and development of parish institutions, of formal liturgy, of forms of
representation (both liturgical and artistic) and of devotional literature as well
as of the buildings themselves and their fittings and furnishings in order to try
to understand the religious ‘environment’. The intention is to cast light on the
nature of the religious experience of our medieval ancestors and to
emphasise its constantly changing nature.
Schematic views of the impact of different altar positions in twelfth-century churches on the
view of the laity. Drawn by Allan T Adams.  English Heritage. NMR.
In addition to exploring aspects of medieval culture, the project has a practical
purpose to deepen understanding of the significance of medieval parish
churches, perhaps the most characteristic of English buildings. This will assist
in the management of the changes to them which will be an inevitable
consequence of the cycle of repair and renewal in living buildings, as well as
of the changes of use which are engendered by redundancy.
The Monograph
The precise arrangement of the proposed monograph, which will be heavily
illustrated with photographs, drawn plans and sections and imaginative
reconstructions of interiors, has not been finalised, but its contents can be
divided into four broad parts:

Introductory. A brief scene-setting section which will explain the
origins of the project, the historical and conservation issues the
book seeks to address and the methodology, as well as giving a



brief overview of the development of the medieval Church in
Northamptonshire.
The Evolution of Fabric and Form. The physical evidence of
medieval places of worship will be examined to establish the
broad chronological pattern of development in the county. The
main punctuation marks will be the Gregorian Reform, the
Fourth Lateran Council, and the rise of the Feast of Corpus
Christi, rather than events (such as the Norman Conquest) from
secular or art history.
Form and Function. Using the same periodisation as above, the
reasons for the evolution of the form of churches will be
examined, concentrating more on trends than on individual
examples. Significant findings already discerned relate to the
ways in which both greater and lesser churches may have been
used in the pre-Conquest period, and to changes in the later
11th and the 12th centuries. These can be related to
developments in ecclesiastical organisation (the foundation of
parishes; the status of the clergy), in doctrine (particularly
relating to the Eucharist) and in liturgy and devotion.
Concluding. Why do these buildings matter? At one level
because they represent fixed points in the landscape, which
have endured for centuries and enable communities to reach
back into the past. But at another level because they have, both
during the middle ages and subsequently, been the focus of
some of the most powerful and divisive events to have affected
the lives of those communities as their members have engaged
in the constantly evolving human quest to understand and
express their place in the world.
Timetable
The recording of the buildings has been completed for some time, much of the
necessary wider research has been achieved, and a first attempt at an
analysis of the evolution of church fabric undertaken. It is anticipated that the
remaining work will take two or three years, so that publication will probably
not be feasible until 2008 or 2009.
Imaginative reconstruction of Vespers for the Dead in St John the Baptist’s Church, Blisworth,
on the eve of the Reformation. Drawn by Alan T Adams. © English Heritage. NMR.
Publications to Date
During the course of the protracted evolution of the project there have already
been some publications on aspects of the work as it has developed. They
include:
H Richmond, ‘Outlines of Church Development in Northamptonshire’, in L A S
Butler and R K Morris (eds), The Anglo-Saxon Church: Papers on History,
Architecture and Archaeology in Honour of Dr H M Taylor, CBA Research
Report 60 (London, 1986), pp 176–87
T H Cocke, ‘Northamptonshire Towers and Spires’, in J Bold and E Cheney
(eds), English Architecture Public and Private (London, 1993), pp 1–11
P S Barnwell, ‘Churches Built for Priests? The Evolution of Parish Churches in
Northamptonshire from the Gregorian Reform to the Fourth Lateran Council’,
Ecclesiology Today, 32 (2004), pp 7–23
P S Barnwell, ‘The Laity, the Clergy and the Divine Presence: The Use of
Space in Smaller Churches of the Eleventh and Twelfth Centuries’, Journal of
the British Archaeological Association, 157 (2004), pp 41–60
P S Barnwell, ‘The Use of the Church: Blisworth, Northamptonshire, on the
Eve of the Reformation’, to appear in Ecclesiology Today
Related work is to be found in P S Barnwell, C Cross and A Rycraft (eds),
Mass and Parish in Late Medieval England: The Use of York (Reading, 2005)