Sompting church

I mentioned yesterday that the church at Whitcombe in Dorset had 1,000 year old stone fragments. Believe it or not, this Saxon church tower at Sompting in West Sussex is probably also 1,000 years old. There aren't many churches surviving in Britain from that period, so I was pretty excited to see this.

I know that medieval church architecture isn't everyone's cup of tea so skip the lecture below if you're not interested.

Sompting church is particularly famous for its spire which is of a 'Rhenish helm' style unique in England, but also found in the Rhine area in Germany. Unusually, other bits of Saxon stonework have been preserved within later architecture, including some carved capitals, a short section of a carved frieze, and a carved stone panel of an abbott.

I have to confess I was pretty hazy about the Saxons until recently. I'm not a historian but with the help of Bernard Cornwell's novels I've pieced together a basic understanding. The Saxons came to Britain from Germany in the fifth century, fought the Britons out of England, gave us four days of the week (Tiw's day, Woden's day, Thor's day and Frigg's day), converted to Christianity, fought the invading Danes out of southern England, but were unable to repel the invading Normans at Hastings. During the Saxon era southern England started to emerge from the chaos and lawlessness of the 'Dark Ages' to become a unified kingdom.