A Little History of the English Country Church

by Roy Strong

This fascinating book tells the dramatic story of the English parish church, from the first temporary buildings erected in Anglo-Saxon times to its uncertain future in the 21st century. Starting with the Christianization of Britain by missionaries from Ireland and Rome, it journeys through the Middle Ages, when elaboration and beauty in church art and architecture reached their peak in the building boom of the 14th and 15th centuries. It describes in vivid detail the rituals and ceremonies at the heart of the parish the processions and celebrations of the church year, the public piety and rites of passage that guided parishioners through their lives and, most of all, the miracle of the Mass performed every Sunday. The rich spirituality of medieval Catholicism was destroyed by the cataclysm of the "long Reformation" in the 16th and 17th centuries, which replaced the splendor of Catholic ritual and its adoration of the Sacrament with a simple service that centered on the preaching of the Word. From the mid-17th century on, reformers tried to repair the damage caused by the iconoclasm of the Reformation by reintroducing images, decoration, and ceremony to the average country church. From the "beauty of holiness," advocated by Archbishop Laud in the 1630s to the liturgical revival of the Oxford Movement in the 19th century, they looked back to the Middle Ages for a tradition of worship that engaged all the senses. In addition, the disintegration of the rural community from the early 19th century would change the social setting of the English country church for ever. Yet despite the dramatic changes that took place inside the parish church over the centuries, the building remained a symbol of continuity, etched into the tableau of the English countryside. Over the last few decades, however, the building itself has come under threat and this volume concludes that, in order to survive, the country church will need to find a new role within a changed countryside.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Architecture, Christian, Reference, Religion

272 pages, Hardcover

First published September 6, 2007

About the author

Sir Roy Colin Strong FRSL (23 August 1935 - ) is an English art historian, museum curator, writer, broadcaster and landscape designer.

He has been director of both the National Portrait Gallery and the Victoria and Albert Museum in London. He was knighted in 1983.

Reviews

[Neelakantan K.K. · Rating 5 out of 5]

A lovely little book. Lucid, well-written, and quite interesting. Sir Roy Strong discusses the changes that the English country church has gone through in all these years,how these changes affected it architecturally, how they changed the liturgy, how they changed how the service was performed, how people might have reacted, and also how the community around the church was affected by these changes.

The book manages to convey the beauty of these churches very well. Sir Roy might be right in considering 'adaptation' to be the way forward.

Worth reading.

[Julie Horton · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent - church history with a focus on its effects on the local church and the people who belong to it. Lots of fascinating detail of what churches were like and how things were done. Alas for the long-standing tradition of brewing church ale...

[Shirley Revill · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of my second hand book shop finds and I really enjoyed reading this book.
Really interesting.

[Tim · Rating 5 out of 5]

One is Apt to think of the country church as the epitome of peace and tranquility, unchanged for centuries and hallowed by ancient tradition. However as this excellently written work shows it is anything but. If you know where to look you can see the scars of ferocious culture wars, high politics and low politics, responses to threats real and imagined and a reflection of society down the years. This is an excellent survey of 1000 years of the parish church and is both learned and readable.

[Richard Thomas · Rating 5 out of 5]

A nice idiosyncratic potboiler of a book.

[Les Dangerfield · Rating 4 out of 5]

My personal interest in this subject stems partly from having been brought up in 50s and 60s England, when just about everyone had experience of the local parish church if only through school and partly though my interest in visiting these churches on my walks and other travels around the country - the more isolated the better . The former experience provides one of the key foundation stones 0f what it is to be English - at least for my generation. Churches are often the oldest buildings in their locality and thus do more than anything else to tell you about the history of the town or village and thus of your own roots.

I have tended to think of churches as timeless and unchangeable both in their structure and in their religious proceedings, but of course they do change, always have and always will. This book describes those changes and how and why they happened over the centuries. It's interesting to understand better the things you took for granted as permanent, particularly in childhood experience of the church, and to know something of their origins, whether the internal. design of the church, the seating arrangements of whether people sang or not during church services, for instance.

It's a huge and difficult subject so Roy Strong has done well to encapsulate it in 235 pages. I will certainly see churches quite differently whenever I drop in during my country walks as a result of reading this book.

[Mark Pollock · Rating 4 out of 5]

When I started this book I expected a little history of the architecture of the English country church. What I got was a history of the ceremonies of the English country church, which I found to delightfully, and unexpectedly, interesting. The ceremonies are harder to document but the author has clearly spent hours researching to give a coherent narrative of how these ceremonies, so divorced from the modern day parish church eucharist, have changed over time - as well as anecdotal 'what the people would have made of this' comments scattered throughout.
I did however find it lacking in a couple of distinct areas. Regional differences, whilst there are many and these differences are vast - I think they got too little attention and too anecdotally a mention for me to be satisfied. Of course like many church books it is brimming with anecdotes on little churches preserving traditions or innovated ceremonies but that doesn't give the reader and appreciation for what was happening as a whole, which the reader desperately wants.
I've yet to find a book on parish churches that makes appropriate uses of maps, or joins together a narrative without relying on individual church anecdotes to make it. Recommendations appreciated for this purpose.

[Avril · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this book as an outsider; not only am I Australian, I’m a minister in a church descended from the Nonconformist Presbyterian, Methodist and Congregational churches. I am more pro-Puritan than the author, and definitely not as committed to church decoration. But I still enjoyed this brief journey through a millennium and a half of church building in England, and I completely agree with the point he makes in his Epilogue: that throughout history it has been possible for churches to be changed and renovated according to the beliefs and needs of the users. Nowadays most churches are ‘preserved’ as historic relics, rather than as the place of worship for a 21st century congregation.

[David Blankenship · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fascinating little book about the changes that have taken place in English churches over the last millennia. From medieval Catholic churches through the Anglican Reformation through the many different varieties of Christianity over the past 500 years, this is the story of how architecture and worship have changed in English worship houses. This would have been as interesting were it twice as long and detailed.

[Val Cowan · Rating 5 out of 5]

A well written, well researched book ( would expect nothing less from Roy Strong!) Fascinating insight into the world of the Church of England in our country parishes from Henry VIII and ‘the King’s Great Matter’ to the present. Modern Anglicans think that this time is the time of greatest change and turmoil - read this book and you will see that there is nothing new under the sun!

[Ed Crutchley · Rating 5 out of 5]

I expected Roy Strong’s book to be a description of how the English country church had remained a pillar of stability, influence and continuity through tumultuous ages. In fact, this delightfully readable account is full of surprises and a wealth of detail of what actually happened, which seems to have been quite the opposite. Admittedly to some extent because of its condensed nature in relation to the time span covered, it shows how congregations around the country were subjected to constant and significant changes in the manner and surroundings in which they were asked to pray and what they were allowed to pray about. As the revolt against popery took hold and the church evolved between the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, customs and rules were incessantly subjected to what Roy Strong refers to as a theological pendulum. Kings, Queens, various religious movements, and to some extent local gentry, had their way with a largely illiterate congregation whose reaction even today remains unknown. Until the seventeenth century, sermons were a rarity; the educational level of the majority of vicars did not allow it, and a licencing system made sure they did not try. Medieval communal activities centred on the parish church (parish ale, Sunday sports, etc) were got rid of, and then some re-allowed. The Act of Uniformity drawn up in 1558 imposed a fine on those who did not attend on Sundays (£11 today). The state visibly took over, and hitherto popular financial contributions declined as they were perceived to be yet another form of tax. After a relatively quiet eighteenth century came the Victorian explosion; the influences of the Oxford Movement and the Cambridge Camden Society, a series of influential architects, the return of music in the form of hymns and organs, and in a climate of increased competition with other faiths that included a re-tolerated Catholicism, a huge amount of church reparation, new building and embellishment. And yet despite it all, Roy Strong mentions that between 1831 and 1911, Anglican church attendance at Easter varied between only 6 and 8%. One might never have guessed.
The book is helped by frequent illustrations, but several pages oddly have the feature of paragraphs of slightly varying type size. Is this a new attempt to vary our reading experience? Thanks to the author it was a good one, anyway.

[Martin Mostek · Rating 4 out of 5]

Roy Strong's A Little History of English country church may look like a rather slim volume on such a vast topic as history of English church (both as an institution and building). But it is certainly clearly and interestingly written. We may call it sketch or outline, in both cases it is drawn by skilled and experienced hand. It goes without saying that it does not provide full picture of so many centuries with so many changes, upheavals and twists of events. But the picture is clear and many times certainly inviting to look for further details on this or that particular era elsewhere.
Strong says something along the line, that his little book is an attempt to turn attention to English parish (especially country parish) church before it will be too late to save it. His account of history of English church as it wrote, rewrote, erased a rewrote anew onto and into fabric and furniture of its churches certainly put into focus role of country church as a important and invaluable witness to history of both its nation and its ecclesiastic institutions: even when book seems to focus and perhaps it is inevitable (especially from Tudor period to Restoration, Glorious Revolution and so on), on cataclysmatic history of ecclesiastic structures, institutions and rules, which are illustrated by changes done in this or that particular church.
If there is one thing, which I found especially surprising and one with which I am not much ready to agree, it suggestion in the very end of this book. Roy Strong seems to make case for that the future of country church is not in "preservation" but in "adaptation". He argue his case well, but I think that argument of church as single "multiple-purpose" building for whole community, where worship was little more than one of its "function" is somewhat (and suprpisingly so) ahistorical.
Nevertheless, A Little History of English country church is good and well written read proving concise and accessible invitation to further interest in English church and English churches.

[Jane Walker · Rating 5 out of 5]

A delightful book which explains very lucidly the history of the church in this country, though the Reformation and the various other upheavals, and the effects of that on the fabric of church buildings and their place in rural life.

[Madeleine McDonald · Rating 5 out of 5]

A leisurely, erudite stroll through centuries of history, from the first Celtic evangelists to the secular 20th century. The author uses details of architecture, decoration or furniture in specific churches as a springboard to consider what changed and what remained constant in local life throughout the religious upheavals imposed from above. Sir Roy covers pagan symbolism, the turbulence of the Reformation, the ambiguity and compromises of Elizabeth's reign, and the challenges from Puritans and Methodists. A fascinating read.

[Sitatunga · Rating 5 out of 5]

Riposte to Jenkins, evokes a vanished world and reminds us what churches really are, how they came into being, why and how they evolved, what there is to see today and the story behind each and every object. A door into Eamon Duffy’s seminal work (ibid.).