St Mark's Church
Proper To Grow Wise In
"A serious house on serious earth it is,
In whose blent air all our compulsions meet,
Are recognised, and robed as destinies.
And that much never can be obsolete,
Since someone will forever be surprising
A hunger in himself to be more serious,
And gravitating with it to this ground,
Which, he once heard, was proper to grow wise in,
If only that so many dead lie round."
Philip Larkin: Churchgoing
Known as an atheist, or at least agnostic, Philip Larkin gives a somewhat mocking tone to the early verses of his poem Churchgoing. But for all that, he continually visits churches and although he doesn’t really believe in God or religion, try as he might he can’t envisage a world without them, and is even compelled to stand hatless and “take off my cycle clips in awkward reverence”. In the final verse, above, any element of disrespect is dropped and he comes to express something of the essence of the English country church.
St Mark’s is such a church but serious house on serious earth though it may be, it is not forbidding or stern but a quiet place of peace, rare enough, that realises the hope in Whittier’s hymn to “take from our souls the strain and stress”. Even the casual visitor, like Larkin, may feel something of this but his “tense, musty silence, brewed God knows how long” comes not from the continuity of an unchanging building for it has changed many times since it was first built: in architecture, decoration and appurtenances; but from a continuity of worship (in whatever style) by generation on generation of village inhabitants for whom this was (and is) a comfortable place, as familiar as home, and just as much entwined in their lives; the scene of celebrations and family occasions: Christmas, Easter, Harvest Home, and baptism, marriage and burial, over the centuries. Even in today’s mobile society it is not yet completely unknown for one to be able to stand in the churchyard and read the familiar family names, many now only faintly legible, on the ranks of headstones and see his family history laid out before him.
It is said that that there was an oratory or chapel in Englefield (site unknown) in the time of the Saxon King Egbert in 802, evidenced by a terrier of lands in which there is mentioned a "Cantaria de Englefield". This comes from a book on the Baronetage published in 1720. Cantaria was a Medieval Latin word that had a number of different meanings, one of which was a private chapel such as a Manorial Chapel (see The Chantry).
There was certainly a church in Englefield before the end of the 12th century for in 1183 its patron, William Englefield, wrote that "...the church of Englefield from ancient times was by right of the monastery of Reading..." and that he had granted the advowson to Reading Abbey during the time of Abbot Joseph (1173-80), although he later rescinded the gift. This was a time referred to by Sir Roy Strong as the “Great Rebuilding” when the village emerged as the new rural social unit and lords of the manor built small churches for public worship in their communities, providing a more local focus than the Minster or Abbey in the nearest town. At this time the church was physically, as well as spiritually, at the centre of the community for the village itself was clustered close to it until it was moved at the beginning of the 19th century.
The nave and chancel of St Mark’s, although much changed, probably form the original structure as during the 19th century rebuilding of the chancel a Norman piscina was found in the south wall of the chancel; it is now in the Englefield chapel. Whether the dedication was always to St Mark is uncertain for it is known that a great many churches only received their current dedication in the 18th or even 19th century and early records do not mention the church by name.
The aisle was soon added, early in the 13th century, and the triple lancet window in its east wall is the only original one to remain in the building, although the stained glass is Victorian. The south (main) doorway and the north doorway, now leading into the choir vestry, are also of the thirteenth century, although heavily restored. An aisle added on the south side (God’s side) at this time is perhaps a little unusual since space in that part of the churchyard tended to be maximised for burial of important people with any additions to the building on the north side (the devil’s side), which also avoided the need to rebuild the porch, an important feature. While the lords of the manor had their tombs and ledger stones in the church itself, in the ground on this side of the church tended to be buried the second rank such as yeoman farmers. This tradition continued at Englefield for here, alongside the path are the tombs of the May, Draper and Welch families and prominent headstones for members of the Horn, and Povey families. The Englefield Chapel, on the north side of the sanctuary, was added in 1514.
The church as it looked around 1790 is shown in an engraving by Charles Tomkins (left) that was included in a book of prints of scenes of Reading Abbey and the churches originally connected with it, published in 1802.
The print of Englefield church shows plain, apparently rendered walls, with battlements and a small, square tower with pointed wooden roof. The windows visible are square-headed and similar to those still to be seen in the Englefield chapel, although these are modern replacements. The church is similar in appearance to other local unrestored churches at Sulhamstead Abbots, Tidmarsh and Padworth. Padworth has the same square-headed, three-light windows (though without the trefoil over) but these are known to have been replaced in the sixteenth century, around the time that the Englefield Chapel was built. So it is possible that even the Tomkins drawing shows at least a partly 16th century facade rather than the original one. Some work had certainly been done before the major restoration in the Victorian Gothic style (part of the second "great rebuilding") for when the church was described by W Fletcher in A Tour Round Reading published in 1841 it was already said to be “partly in the early English style of architecture, but much modernised”. Otherwise the description is exactly as Tomkins’s drawing.
Two sketches in the archives at Lambeth Palace (unfortunately too faded to reproduce) by an anonymous artist but evidently made in the early 19th century show the same building but one of them shows the triple lancet east window in the aisle and a similar three-light window with arched header in the east wall of the chancel. While the former was preserved during the rebuilding, the window in the chancel was replaced by a new one. The stained glass in both is from the 1850s and is by John Hardman of Birmingham.
Elias Ashmole
It is largely thanks to Elias Ashmole, the 17th century antiquary, politician and founder of the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford, that we know a little about St Mark’s in earlier times.
The Lysons’ Magna Britannia says that Ashmole came to reside in Englefield in 1647. His diary certainly shows that he visited Englefield that year when he went from his house in London to Englefield and dined with Antipas Cherrington, on 12th June. Two days later, Ashmole records first meeting Gilbert Wimberley, Minister of Englefield. At this time Ashmole was paying court to Lady Mainwaring of Bradfield House, the widow of Sir Thomas Mainwaring, Recorder of Reading, and on 16th November 1649 he married her, thereby gaining an estate at Bradfield House. Later on 23rd November 1653 Ashmole recorded “My good friend and neighbour Dr Wimberley, Minister of Englefield in Berkshire, died”. So the Lysons seem to have interpreted “neighbour” rather in the closer urban sense than the country one and out of context
The north elevation of the Englefield Chapel showing the (modern) square-headed windows
Ashmole’s descriptions of the many monuments in Englefield church were published in the History and Antiquities of Berkshire in 1723, after his death. The book was not written by him but was based on notes he deposited with the College of Heralds. These notes were made during his Visitation of Berkshire, begun on 11th March 1665 and are used here in preference to the published work.