Another redundant church - Allexton

I've cycled past Allexton, driven past the village, but never stopped to look. It was only while walking the Leicestershire Round that our route took us into the village and past St Peter's church.  We allow a bit of extra exploration time on most of our walks, so we made a short detour into the church.

Stone lions guard the door, and there are dormer windows in the roof.

Inside there are two Norman arches, decorated with zigzag carving, similar to those at Tickencote. They were restored in the nineteenth century, but are said to be close to the originals.

There was once a third arch - you can see the beginning of it, with a carved face .

The rest of the arch now forms part of the church tower, and its shape can be seen on the outside wall.

Some medieval stained glass has been re-assembled.  In the church itself there is a naked man climbing a ladder. This may have been part of a doomsday scene.  In the vestry there are two small windows - one has a manticore (top left in the first photo below, and only half visible) - a mythical half man-half beast creature.The other shows twin birds touching at the beak.

 

A close-up of the manticore

The memorial tablets on the back wall inside are dedicated to a vicar, who lived into his seventies, and his wife, who died in childbirth, aged 20. The child survived.

This stone urn stands on the table-top tomb of Thomas Hotchkin, a sugar plantation and slave owner, who died in 1774.

The church was declared redundant in 2000 and placed in the care of The Churches Conservation Trust. Much of the information in this post is from their leaflet.