Listed Building record MDO9041 - Chapel of Saint Catherine, Milton Abbey, Milton Abbas

Late twelfth century chapel of Milton Abbey. Restored in 1901 after a period of secular use. Flint and rubble stone walls with ashlar dressings. Stone slate roofs with coped gables. Remains of inscription on door jamb granting 120 days' indulgence. Good example of a largely unaltered small Norman church.

St Catherine's Chapel: the building has been "restored" but has Norman doorways in the north and south sides, and Perpendicular windows. It was at one time used as a pigeon-house, and later occupied as a cottage.(2).

Abbot Middleton (1481-1525) is supposed to have done some restoration and this may include the perpendicular windows <3>.

The building is in a fairly good state of repair, but has been extensively rstored. The walls are of flint with stone corners and have three stone buttresses on the north side and four on the south side. There is a Norman doorway on the south side, with a Lombard inscription on one of the jambs. There are the remains of a similar type of doorway on the north side. There are single 2-light Perpendicular windows in the north and south walls. Other windows appear to be comparatively modern, and the roof is completely modern. <4>

St Catherine's Chapel : Grade 1. <5>

Chapel of St Catherine. Grade I. <7,8>

<1> Ordnance Survey, Ordnance Survey Map 6in, 1902 (Map). SWX1540.

(ST 80120233) St Catherine's Chapel

<2> Hutchins, J, 1873, The history and antiquities of the County of Dorset. Volume 4. 3rd edition (Monograph). SDO10245.

<3> Pentin Rev H, 1904, Milton Abbey and its School, 23 (Unpublished document). SDO17591.

<4> Quinnell, N V, Various, Field Investigators Comments NVQ, F1 NVQ 30-AUG-55 (Unpublished document). SDO11903.

<5> DOE (HHR), 1954, List of Buildings of Special Historic or Architectural Interest: Blandford Rural District, 9 (Scheduling record). SDO17701.

<6> Ordnance Survey, Ordnance Survey Map 6in, 1969 (Map). SWX1540.

(ST ')120233) St Catherine's chapel (NR) (restored).

<7> DOE (HHR), 1983, List of Buildings of Special Architectural or Historic Interest: North Dorset District, 60 (Scheduling record). SDO17556.

Oct 1985

<8> Newman, J, and Pevsner, N, 1972, The Buildings of England: Dorset (Monograph). SWX1290.

<9> English Heritage, 2005, Register of parks and gardens of special historic interest in England: Dorset (Revised), 12 (Monograph). SDO17438.

<10> Royal Commission on Historic Monuments, 1970, An Inventory of Historical Monuments in the County of Dorset, Volume III (Central) Part 2, 190-191 (Monograph). SDO136.

‘(3) THE CHAPEL OF ST. CATHERINE (80110234), 300 yds. due E. of the Abbey Church and set on a hill overlooking it, has original walls of roughly coursed flint with dressings of Ham Hill and local limestone, and roofs covered with stone-slates in the lower parts and with tiles above (Plate 178). The Nave and Chancel are of the late 12th century; the nave was strengthened with buttresses and some of the windows were enlarged in the late 15th or early 16th century; the E. window of the chancel and the W. wall of the nave were rebuilt in the 18th century, and the chancel walls were heightened at that time. The chapel was converted to secular uses in the 19th century but it was restored as a place of worship in 1901.
The chapel stands on the lowest of a series of artificial terraces (see below, (24)) and inside a rectangular Enclosure, 110 yds. by about 40 yds., orientated N.–S. The enclosure is defined by a low spread bank with an external ditch on the N., E. and S. sides, and by the scarp of the terrace on the W. The S. half of the enclosure is divided into two unequal parts by a low scarp running due S. from the E. end of the chapel. There is no support for the legend that the enclosure is King Athelstan's work (Hutchins IV, 409) and it appears to be no more than a chapel-yard.
The chapel retains a noteworthy late 12th-century chancel arch and it is paved with well preserved 13th-century slip tiles brought from (1). The S. doorway has a late 12th-century inscription granting 120 days indulgence.
Architectural Description—The Chancel (18½ ft. by 15 ft.) has original ashlar quoins at the N.E. and S.E. angles; in the E. wall is an 18th-century window of three ogee-headed lights with vertical tracery in a two-centred head. In the N. and S. walls are traces of blocked windows. The chancel arch (Plate 179) is of the late 12th century and is two-centred and of two orders; the inner order is plain, the outer order has a roll-moulding and a chamfered hood-mould with beast-head stops. In the responds the inner order rests on clusters of attached shafts with chamfered plinths, moulded bases and scalloped capitals with nail-head enrichment below chamfered abaci; the centre shaft on each side is keeled. The roll-moulding of the outer order continues on the responds. The Nave (38 ft. by 19 ft.) has original ashlar quoins at the N.E. and S.E. corners; in the N. part of the E. wall is the weathered drip-moulding of an earlier chancel roof. In the N. wall is a late 15th or early 16th-century square-headed window of two ogee-headed lights with hollow-chamfered mullions and jambs, pierced spandrels and a hollow-chamfered surround. The late 12th-century N. doorway has a plain segmental head springing from ashlar jambs with hollow-chamfered abaci; to the W. of the doorway is a small original window of one round-headed light, chamfered externally and with wide internal splays. The S. wall of the nave has two windows and a doorway, corresponding with and similar to those on the N.; the S. doorway (Plate 10) is richer than that on the N., having above the segmental head a round-headed tympanum and an outer arch with a roll-moulding and a hollow-chamfered label; the arch springs from notched and hollow-chamfered abaci above responds with attached three-quarter columns with keeled shafts, foliate caps and moulded bases. The W. respond bears a late 12th-century inscription (see below). The 15th-century buttresses on both sides of the nave are of two weathered stages with chamfered plinths. The W. wall was refaced with ashlar and knapped flint-work in the 18th century; at the centre is a 19th-century lancet window in a round-headed recess. The roofs are modern.
Fittings—Bracket: In chancel, reset on E. wall, polygonal, with moulded and panelled enrichment, 15th century, probably from (1). Brasses. On inner side of S. door, plate with semicircular head engraved with facsimile of indulgence inscription (q.v.), 1793; on S. door, rectangular plate similarly engraved, probably 18th century. Doors: In N. and S. doorways, oak, 18th century. Inscription: On W. jamb of S. doorway (Plate 49), INDULGENCIA H' Sci. Loci C E[T X]X Dies, incised Lombardic letters, 1½ ins. high, c. 1200. Niche: In nave, beside N. doorway, with four-centred head, perhaps 15th century. Tiles: In chancel and at W. end of nave, of 13th to 15th centuries, red and brown clay with yellow slip decoration; patterns include varieties of interlacework, horsemen with swords and bows, peacocks, dogs, stags, heraldic mullets, lions passant, fleurs-de-lis, chevrons, frets, crowned M, a shield vair, a shield of a lion within a border bezanty, three birds, arms of See of Exeter; tiles transferred from (1) in 19th century.’

<11> National Record of the Historic Environment, 201927 (Digital archive). SDO14739.

Record last edited

Mar 16 2022 11:02AM