Historical Background of All Saints' Church, Mattishall

For details about the reordering undertaken recently, click the following link: RECENT CHANGES TO ALL SAINTS' MATTISHALL

The Population

The population of the two villages of Mattishall and Mattishall Burgh, reached an historical peak of 1385 in 1841 and then began to decline as, due to mechanisation on farms, people left the area to look for work. By 1931 the figure had dropped to 829 and by 1961 was 929. Since then substantial development and infilling has taken place resulting in rapid increases in the population to an estimated population of 2,700 in 2004.

The Church

All Saints Church, Mattishall, a grade 1 listed building, dates from the late 14th century, when the local weaving industry was at its height, is mainly Perpendicular period architecture.   It has flint with ashlar and some brick dressings; lead roofs; an aisled nave with north and south porches; and a chancel with a south chapel. The late C14 west tower exhibits the feature of the early part of the Perpendicular period. There is short leaded spire with cupola and weather vane dated 1640. The Patron is Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge and they are responsible for the Chancel.  It is thought that Dr. Caius was instrumental in initiating the building of the larger church.

There is a late Medieval hammerbeam roof to the nave. The hammers are finely carved, representing angels, saints and possibly donors. All the heads and some figures are renewed.

Mattishall's greatest treasure is the dado of the roodscreen painted in 1453. The panels have two subjects in each panel where the 12 apostles hold a sequence of scrolls containing the clauses of the Apostles Creed. There is a traditional pattern to which apostle holds which clause, and so identification is relatively easy. On the north side they are Philip, Bartholomew, Matthias, Simon, Jude and Matthew. On the south side are Peter, Andrew, James, John, Thomas and James the Less.  They were painted over at the Reformation until a curate of Mattishall Burgh restored them by rubbing off the paint with a wet finger.

There are a number of medieval figure brasses in the nave, but they have been reused on late 17th century ledger stones. One, to Geoffrey Dane is now resplendent on the tomb of Susan Edwards, a curious cross-gender arrangement. Perhaps they were unable to read the Latin, and assumed that the long hair made him a woman. No less than two brass figures have been reused on the 1688 tomb of William Brabant who was Rector here.

The remaining pews are largely Victorian and twenty six pew ends are interesting examples of East Anglian Nave seating from 1400 - 1430 and are comparatively rare.

The Royal Arms above the font are to George II. There are seven bells in the belfry dating from 1530 (The Angelus bell) to 1652 and are still in regular use.

 

FOR MORE INFORMATION PLEASE SEE HISTORICAL BACKGROUND 2