St Martin, Fincham

St Martin’s is a Grade I parish church on the High Street, Fincham, Norfolk, in the Diocese of Ely, a mid-fifteenth-century Perpendicular village church.

Overview

Historic England records a mid-fifteenth-century parish church restored in 1847 and 1870. The fabric is flint and carstone with ashlar dressings and leaded roofs. The plan comprises a west tower, nave, aisles and chancel. The three-stage tower has angle buttresses to the belfry, a plinth with pointed trefoil arcading, an arched west door under a nineteenth-century square surround, and a four-light west window. The battlemented parapet has trefoil arcading. The gabled south porch has angle buttresses and a carved parapet inscribed with the date of a later restoration. The south aisle has stepped flushwork buttresses rising through a flushwork crenellated parapet to crocketed pinnacles, and three-light panel-traceried windows. Clerestory windows are of three lights with supermullions. A two-storey vestry of about 1500 obscures the north chancel.

Parish notes state that the church was rebuilt in the mid-fifteenth century, thought to be on the walls of an earlier building, and that the Fincham family were the principal donors. Flushwork on the buttresses includes an M for Mary, IHS and the Fincham arms. Wikipedia records a famous font on four legs depicting Gospel scenes, and that a second village church, St Michael, was demolished in the mid-nineteenth century.

Further Information

• Historic England list entry 1077822
• British Listed Buildings: Church of St Martin