St Mary's Church, Kirtlington

St Mary's is the parish church of Kirtlington, south-west of Bicester: Norman arches under a tower the Victorians built after the Georgians pulled the old one down, late medieval paintings of St George and St Christopher, and the chapel of the Dashwoods of Kirtlington Park. Historic England lists it Grade II*.

The story of St Mary's

A Saxon church probably stood here, the Victoria County History says, but the first record is Domesday Book, which names the priest, Osmund. The parish's own history adds that King Edward the Martyr held a meeting at Kirtlington in 977. Later Jordan and Lucy de Say gave the church to the Cistercian abbey of Aulnay, which they had founded.

The oldest work you can see is early twelfth century: the arches that carry the central tower and a carved tympanum now over the vestry door. Foundations of an apse were found under the chancel floor in 1877. About 1250 the nave was rebuilt with north and south aisles. The apse gave way to a square-ended chancel later in the twelfth century, the county history says, though the parish puts it late in the thirteenth. The fifteenth century added the clerestory and the south porch and rebuilt the south aisle wall.

The Dashwoods and the lost tower

In 1716 Sir Robert Dashwood turned the ruinous Lady Chapel, on the south side, into a family chapel and vault, and in 1726 he added a west gallery. The family were building at the same time: Sir James Dashwood began Kirtlington House in 1741, with John Sanderson as architect, and moved in in 1746, and Capability Brown laid out its grounds between 1755 and 1762.

The church tower was less lucky. It was pulled down in 1770 as unsafe. The story told in the parish's own history is that a dowager Lady Dashwood refused to come to church until it was gone, and that it was so strong it had to be brought down with gunpowder, leaving its arches. A legacy of £300 to rebuild it was not taken up, and the church went without a tower for about 80 years, until Benjamin Ferrey built the present one in a Norman style in the restoration of 1852 to 1854, which also took out the gallery and the old pews and laid Minton tiles. Sir George Gilbert Scott thoroughly restored the chancel in 1877. In 2009 the Victorian pews and nave tiles made way for chairs, York stone paving and underfloor heating.

What to look for

Look for:

• The early twelfth-century tympanum over the vestry door, and the tower arches; Historic England thinks the east arch may be partly older than the Norman Conquest
• The wall paintings of St George and St Christopher on the north wall, mainly late fifteenth century, found again in 1905
• The thirteenth-century nave arcades on quatrefoil columns, with stiff-leaf capitals on the south side, and a hood-mould ending in the head of a woman wearing a nose-band
• The Dashwood chapel's early eighteenth-century wrought-iron screen and gates, said to have come from Northbrook House
• The Dashwood monument of 1724 in the chapel, signed by William and Thomas Williams of Middleton Stoney, partly hidden since 1877 by the organ
• A memorial on the north wall to Thomas, a Black man connected with Sir Robert Dashwood, who died in 1691, and a baroque cartouche to James Evans, who died in 1702
• A mid-seventeenth-century pulpit and communion table, a double piscina in the chancel, and glass of about 1852 by Thomas Willement in the south aisle

The ring of eight bells is mostly of 1718, when it was increased from five.

Visiting St Mary's

The church's A Church Near You page says it is normally open during daylight hours. It has a monthly pattern of services, including a Lamb Ale service and Evensong; on Sunday 15 November 2026 Evensong is at 4pm. The Oxfordshire Historic Churches Trust lists toilets. We found no published access statement, so ring 01869 350224 if you need to check the step at the door.

The Lamb Ale is Kirtlington's own feast. The county history traces it to a royal charter of 1562 that freed the villagers from tolls; it was long established by 1679, when it ran for two days from Trinity Monday, lapsed in the nineteenth century and was later revived in a different form.

Getting there

The church is on Church Lane, postcode OX5 3HF. The Oxford Arms is about 100 metres away, by our measurement on the map. Kirtlington is about five and a half miles south-west of Bicester.

Nearby

Rousham House and Garden is about three miles north, up the Cherwell valley. In Bicester, St Edburg's Church has another run of Georgian monuments, and Alchester, the Roman town, is on the way.