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St Mary de Castro (Dover)
Encyclopedia
St Mary in Castro, or St Mary de Castro, is a church in the grounds of Dover Castle
, Kent
, south-east England
. It is a heavily restored Saxon
structure, built next to a Roman
lighthouse which became the church bell-tower. St Mary serves the local population and the army
, and is the church of the Dover Garrison.
is a major port on the south-east coast of England
, at a gap in the white cliffs
near the narrowest point of the English Channel
. Its proximity to mainland Europe
has made it a key military, maritime and trade location for millennia. The Romans
built forts here in c. AD130 and c. AD270,
and the town has fortifications from many eras since. The Romans also built two pharoses, possibly c. AD130,
on the Eastern and Western Heights
above the gap in the cliffs. St Mary in Castro is on the Eastern Heights.
in the 630s. However, it is unclear whether this means within the Saxon burgh (usually dated to later than 630) on the Eastern Heights, or within the ruins of old Roman fortifications in the valley. The large, late-Saxon cemetery around the present church does suggest the existence of a c.600 church,
but not definitively.
Whether or not it had a predecessor, the present Saxon church was built on the Eastern Heights around AD1000. It is immediately adjacent to the surviving eastern pharos, which was used as a source of spolia
: Roman tiles can be still be seen in the church fabric, particularly in the window arches (usually of stone), and flint and tile from the pharos is used throughout the church's walls. The plinth that projects out from beneath the church and on which it stands, however, is of new stone. The church is cruciform
with a central tower the same width as the nave
but broader than the chancel
and transept
s. The nave has no aisle
s. The door arch is the earliest to survive in any standing church in England.
and the altar recess in the nave's southeast corner of the nave were probably both added to the existing church at the end of the twelfth century. As part of his building works at the castle, in 1226 Henry III of England
instructed that the church be repaired and twenty-one years later ordered the making of three altars and images, for and of St. Edmund
, St. Adrian
and St. Edward
, along with an image of St. John the Evangelist.
A new stage was added to the four surviving Roman stages (out of a possible original eight) of the pharos to turn it into a bell tower
, along with a short passage to connect it to the church. In 1252, three bells were cast at Canterbury
to be hung in the pharos. In 1342–3, three bells were sold out of St Mary in Castro to another St Mary's church, in the nearby village of Lower Hardres
, for at least £4.
They were replaced in 1345 by two newly cast bells, weighing 4266 lb and 1078 lb, and costing £15 18s. 5¼d. Between 1426 and 1437, works on the pharos cost £176 11s. 11½d and included five new stone windows in the medieval stage, which may have been rebuilt.
Other works on the church included repainting between 1324 and 1334 by "John of Maidstone", and over £36 spent on church and keep in 1494, although the proportion spent on the church is unknown. The latter work was by Sir Edward Poynings
, who may well have been deputising for Prince Henry
, then the Castle's Constable
.
The remaining ruin was turned into a storehouse and cooperage in 1780, but a further collapse in 1801 led to its becoming a coal
store by 1808, and thus it remained until 1860. That year began the first of two Victorian restoration
s. The first lasted until 1862 and was carried out by George Gilbert Scott
, and the second restoration for only a year in 1888, by William Butterfield
. Butterfield's restoration completed the tower and added mosaic work in the nave and a vestry, but was generally held to be less sympathetic than the first by Scott.
appear to be original, and their west faces are outlined by strip work of projecting tiles. A tall round-headed, stone-faced doorway (now blocked and with not much left of its original stripwork outline, but with its typically Saxon alternating horizontal and vertical slabs) gave access to the nave from the south. Unusual double splayed round-headed windows pierce the nave's north and south walls, and Scott (who found them during his restoration) suggested there were another pair near the west end of the nave's side walls. He saw this pair of windows, and putlog holes
in the walls for supporting timbers, as evidence for a west gallery, for which space needed to be left between that pair of windows and the west wall.
Dover Castle
Dover Castle is a medieval castle in the town of the same name in the English county of Kent. It was founded in the 12th century and has been described as the "Key to England" due to its defensive significance throughout history...
, Kent
Kent
Kent is a county in southeast England, and is one of the home counties. It borders East Sussex, Surrey and Greater London and has a defined boundary with Essex in the middle of the Thames Estuary. The ceremonial county boundaries of Kent include the shire county of Kent and the unitary borough of...
, south-east England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
. It is a heavily restored Saxon
Anglo-Saxon architecture
Anglo-Saxon architecture was a period in the history of architecture in England, and parts of Wales, from the mid-5th century until the Norman Conquest of 1066. Anglo-Saxon secular buildings in Britain were generally simple, constructed mainly using timber with thatch for roofing...
structure, built next to a Roman
Ancient Rome
Ancient Rome was a thriving civilization that grew on the Italian Peninsula as early as the 8th century BC. Located along the Mediterranean Sea and centered on the city of Rome, it expanded to one of the largest empires in the ancient world....
lighthouse which became the church bell-tower. St Mary serves the local population and the army
British Army
The British Army is the land warfare branch of Her Majesty's Armed Forces in the United Kingdom. It came into being with the unification of the Kingdom of England and Scotland into the Kingdom of Great Britain in 1707. The new British Army incorporated Regiments that had already existed in England...
, and is the church of the Dover Garrison.
Location
DoverDover
Dover is a town and major ferry port in the home county of Kent, in South East England. It faces France across the narrowest part of the English Channel, and lies south-east of Canterbury; east of Kent's administrative capital Maidstone; and north-east along the coastline from Dungeness and Hastings...
is a major port on the south-east coast of England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
, at a gap in the white cliffs
White cliffs of Dover
The White Cliffs of Dover are cliffs which form part of the British coastline facing the Strait of Dover and France. The cliffs are part of the North Downs formation. The cliff face, which reaches up to , owes its striking façade to its composition of chalk accentuated by streaks of black flint...
near the narrowest point of the English Channel
English Channel
The English Channel , often referred to simply as the Channel, is an arm of the Atlantic Ocean that separates southern England from northern France, and joins the North Sea to the Atlantic. It is about long and varies in width from at its widest to in the Strait of Dover...
. Its proximity to mainland Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...
has made it a key military, maritime and trade location for millennia. The Romans
Ancient Rome
Ancient Rome was a thriving civilization that grew on the Italian Peninsula as early as the 8th century BC. Located along the Mediterranean Sea and centered on the city of Rome, it expanded to one of the largest empires in the ancient world....
built forts here in c. AD130 and c. AD270,
and the town has fortifications from many eras since. The Romans also built two pharoses, possibly c. AD130,
on the Eastern and Western Heights
Dover Western Heights
The Western Heights of Dover are one of the most impressive fortifications in Britain. They comprise a series of forts, strong points and ditches, designed to protect the country from invasion...
above the gap in the cliffs. St Mary in Castro is on the Eastern Heights.
600
There are records of a church being built 'within the castle' (Latin 'in castra') by Eadbald of KentEadbald of Kent
Eadbald was King of Kent from 616 until his death in 640. He was the son of King Æthelberht and his wife Bertha, a daughter of the Merovingian king Charibert. Æthelberht made Kent the dominant force in England during his reign and became the first Anglo-Saxon king to convert to Christianity from...
in the 630s. However, it is unclear whether this means within the Saxon burgh (usually dated to later than 630) on the Eastern Heights, or within the ruins of old Roman fortifications in the valley. The large, late-Saxon cemetery around the present church does suggest the existence of a c.600 church,
but not definitively.
1000
Spolia
Spolia is a modern art-historical term used to describe the re-use of earlier building material or decorative sculpture on new monuments...
: Roman tiles can be still be seen in the church fabric, particularly in the window arches (usually of stone), and flint and tile from the pharos is used throughout the church's walls. The plinth that projects out from beneath the church and on which it stands, however, is of new stone. The church is cruciform
Cruciform
Cruciform means having the shape of a cross or Christian cross.- Cruciform architectural plan :This is a common description of Christian churches. In Early Christian, Byzantine and other Eastern Orthodox forms of church architecture this is more likely to mean a tetraconch plan, a Greek cross,...
with a central tower the same width as the nave
Nave
In Romanesque and Gothic Christian abbey, cathedral basilica and church architecture, the nave is the central approach to the high altar, the main body of the church. "Nave" was probably suggested by the keel shape of its vaulting...
but broader than the chancel
Chancel
In church architecture, the chancel is the space around the altar in the sanctuary at the liturgical east end of a traditional Christian church building...
and transept
Transept
For the periodical go to The Transept.A transept is a transverse section, of any building, which lies across the main body of the building. In Christian churches, a transept is an area set crosswise to the nave in a cruciform building in Romanesque and Gothic Christian church architecture...
s. The nave has no aisle
Aisle
An aisle is, in general, a space for walking with rows of seats on both sides or with rows of seats on one side and a wall on the other...
s. The door arch is the earliest to survive in any standing church in England.
Medieval rebuilds
The Early English vaultVault (architecture)
A Vault is an architectural term for an arched form used to provide a space with a ceiling or roof. The parts of a vault exert lateral thrust that require a counter resistance. When vaults are built underground, the ground gives all the resistance required...
and the altar recess in the nave's southeast corner of the nave were probably both added to the existing church at the end of the twelfth century. As part of his building works at the castle, in 1226 Henry III of England
Henry III of England
Henry III was the son and successor of John as King of England, reigning for 56 years from 1216 until his death. His contemporaries knew him as Henry of Winchester. He was the first child king in England since the reign of Æthelred the Unready...
instructed that the church be repaired and twenty-one years later ordered the making of three altars and images, for and of St. Edmund
Edmund the Martyr
St Edmund the Martyr was a king of East Anglia, an Anglo-Saxon kingdom which today includes the English counties of Norfolk, Suffolk and Cambridgeshire.D'Evelyn, Charlotte, and Mill, Anna J., , 1956. Reprinted 1967...
, St. Adrian
Adrian of Canterbury
Saint Adrian of Canterbury was a famous scholar and the Abbot of St Augustine's Abbey in Canterbury in the English county of Kent.-Life:...
and St. Edward
Edward the Confessor
Edward the Confessor also known as St. Edward the Confessor , son of Æthelred the Unready and Emma of Normandy, was one of the last Anglo-Saxon kings of England and is usually regarded as the last king of the House of Wessex, ruling from 1042 to 1066....
, along with an image of St. John the Evangelist.
A new stage was added to the four surviving Roman stages (out of a possible original eight) of the pharos to turn it into a bell tower
Bell tower
A bell tower is a tower which contains one or more bells, or which is designed to hold bells, even if it has none. In the European tradition, such a tower most commonly serves as part of a church and contains church bells. When attached to a city hall or other civic building, especially in...
, along with a short passage to connect it to the church. In 1252, three bells were cast at Canterbury
Canterbury
Canterbury is a historic English cathedral city, which lies at the heart of the City of Canterbury, a district of Kent in South East England. It lies on the River Stour....
to be hung in the pharos. In 1342–3, three bells were sold out of St Mary in Castro to another St Mary's church, in the nearby village of Lower Hardres
Lower Hardres
Lower Hardres is a village and civil parish near Canterbury in Kent, South East England.The name of the Hardres family is perpetuated in the twin villages of Upper Hardres and Lower Hardres , on the Roman road, Stone Street, south-west of the city of Canterbury. The family owned this area for...
, for at least £4.
They were replaced in 1345 by two newly cast bells, weighing 4266 lb and 1078 lb, and costing £15 18s. 5¼d. Between 1426 and 1437, works on the pharos cost £176 11s. 11½d and included five new stone windows in the medieval stage, which may have been rebuilt.
Other works on the church included repainting between 1324 and 1334 by "John of Maidstone", and over £36 spent on church and keep in 1494, although the proportion spent on the church is unknown. The latter work was by Sir Edward Poynings
Edward Poynings
Sir Edward Poynings KG was an English soldier, administrator and diplomat, Lord Deputy of Ireland under King Henry VII of England.-Early life:...
, who may well have been deputising for Prince Henry
Henry VIII of England
Henry VIII was King of England from 21 April 1509 until his death. He was Lord, and later King, of Ireland, as well as continuing the nominal claim by the English monarchs to the Kingdom of France...
, then the Castle's Constable
Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports
The Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports is a ceremonial official in the United Kingdom. The post dates from at least the 12th century but may be older. The Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports was originally in charge of the Cinque Ports, a group of five port towns on the southeast coast of England...
.
Neglect and restoration
From 1555 to 1557 the church was walled up as it was felt unsafe due to lack of repairs, though nineteen years later recommendations were made to repair the chancel in stone, glaze (or reglaze) the windows and provide seats for men to hear divine service. It took another six years, but in 1582 fourteen small chairs were at last bought. Public worship then lasted to 1690, though burials of troops from the garrison in the surrounding churchyard continued for some time after that.The remaining ruin was turned into a storehouse and cooperage in 1780, but a further collapse in 1801 led to its becoming a coal
Coal
Coal is a combustible black or brownish-black sedimentary rock usually occurring in rock strata in layers or veins called coal beds or coal seams. The harder forms, such as anthracite coal, can be regarded as metamorphic rock because of later exposure to elevated temperature and pressure...
store by 1808, and thus it remained until 1860. That year began the first of two Victorian restoration
Victorian restoration
Victorian restoration is the term commonly used to refer to the widespread and extensive refurbishment and rebuilding of Church of England churches and cathedrals that took place in England and Wales during the 19th-century reign of Queen Victoria...
s. The first lasted until 1862 and was carried out by George Gilbert Scott
George Gilbert Scott
Sir George Gilbert Scott was an English architect of the Victorian Age, chiefly associated with the design, building and renovation of churches, cathedrals and workhouses...
, and the second restoration for only a year in 1888, by William Butterfield
William Butterfield
William Butterfield was a Gothic Revival architect and associated with the Oxford Movement . He is noted for his use of polychromy-Biography:...
. Butterfield's restoration completed the tower and added mosaic work in the nave and a vestry, but was generally held to be less sympathetic than the first by Scott.
Today
Today Saint Mary in Castro is still a thriving church serving the Army and local people, and is the Dover Garrison Church.Dover Castle Statutes
The Dover Castle Statutes of 1267 on display in Saint Mary in Castro offer a fascinating insight into life in Dover Castle during the medieval age. The Statutes demand order and discipline from the guards, with heavy penalties imposed on any who swear or brawl; they lay-out explicit plans for ceremonies, religious or otherwise, and the ringing of bells; and they detail procedures for deaths, festivals. A copy of the script can be found hereDescription of the present church
The 28 feet high arches at the east and west ends of the crossingCrossing (architecture)
A crossing, in ecclesiastical architecture, is the junction of the four arms of a cruciform church.In a typically oriented church , the crossing gives access to the nave on the west, the transept arms on the north and south, and the choir on the east.The crossing is sometimes surmounted by a tower...
appear to be original, and their west faces are outlined by strip work of projecting tiles. A tall round-headed, stone-faced doorway (now blocked and with not much left of its original stripwork outline, but with its typically Saxon alternating horizontal and vertical slabs) gave access to the nave from the south. Unusual double splayed round-headed windows pierce the nave's north and south walls, and Scott (who found them during his restoration) suggested there were another pair near the west end of the nave's side walls. He saw this pair of windows, and putlog holes
Putlog holes
Putlog holes, as the name implies, are small holes that were intended to receive the ends of logs or squared wooden beams in the walls of buildings, especially in the Middle Ages....
in the walls for supporting timbers, as evidence for a west gallery, for which space needed to be left between that pair of windows and the west wall.
External links
- St Mary in Castro, Dover Castle, Dover A Church Near You. Accessed 2007-10-14
- Dover Museum article on St Mary de Castro