NHER 8653 (Building record) - All Saints' Church, Filby

September 1962. Listed, Grade II*.
Listing Description:
Parish church. C14 with C15 alterations, including tower. Restored 1873 and 1886. Flint with ashlar dressings. Nave roof thatched, aisles leaded, chancel roof slate. West tower, nave, aisles and chancel. 3 stage tower supported on diagonal buttresses. Tall flushwork plinth course decorated with trefoiled arcade. West door within arch enriched with hollow casement and wave mouldings. Above is 3-light Perpendicular C19 window. Quatrefoil ringing chamber ventilation panels within square surrounds. String course below belfry. 2-light belfry windows with mouchette tracery. Flushwork parapet with triple-stepped crenellations. At the corners are turrets with finials. Stairs to south-east. 3-light aisle west windows with reticulation units split by rising supermullions, of C19 date. Cusped 3-light aisle east windows. Diagonal east and west buttresses to aisles and central buttress to flanks. 3 3-light C19 cusped south aisle windows under segmental arches and 3 2-light cusped Y tracery north aisle windows, also C19. Arched south doorway with sunk quadrant and hollow mouldings. Gabled C19 north porch. 4 clerestory windows north and south of encircled quatrefoil design. South chancel lit through one 2-light C14 Y window, the lights supporting rounded trefoils and a quatrefoil vesica. To east a cusped 2-light C14 Y tracery window. Diagonal eastern buttresses. 4-light C19 intersecting east window with encircled quatrefoils within the intersections. C19 lean-to organ chamber to north chancel wall to west of which is a 2-light C14 cusped Y tracery window. Interior. 5 bay octagonal arcade with piers carried on moulded bases. Moulded capitals support double hollow chamfered arches. Clerestory windows deeply splayed. Tall tower arch with semi-circular responds and chamfered arch. Double hollow chamfered chancel arch on polygonal responds identical to arcade. Scissor braced C19 nave roof. Aisle roofs of C19 also, with moulded rafters. Re-cut C13 Purbeck marble octagonal font : central and 8 orbiting marble columns and 2 incised arches each facet of bowl. Holy water stoups by north and south doors. Arched C13 tower stair door of timber decorated with closely set vertical and horizontal wrought iron straps. Lock, guard plate and handle intact. South-east nave chapel marked by trefoiled piscina and C20 aumbry. Early C16 polygonal pulpit with 2 panels each facet. These facets with quatrefoils below and mouchette tracery in head. Dado of chancel screen is C15 : 2 bays each side of opening, each of 2 Perpendicular traceried panels. Each panel painted with figure of a Saint. Top rail of dado has relief carving of painted vine trail. Traceried head of screen of 1886 in Perpendicular style. C19 arch braced chancel roof with ashlaring boarded and pierced by wavy motif. Wall monument to Charles Lucas 1831 by Joseph Hermann (of Dresden). Marble. Above inscription panel is relief stele depicting standing genius bearing extinguished torch. To right the capital of a broken Ionic column. To left an urn bearing word OSSA. Pedimented top. Immediately east is wall monument to Gibson Lucas 1790. Black and white marble. Above inscription panel is black marble obelisk against which is mourning Greek seated upon sarcophagus embracing 2 urns. To east a mutilated piscina.
Information from (S1).
H. Mellor (HES), 26 June 2017.

Church mostly early 14th century but tower is 15th/16th.
South porch demolished.
Late 19th century restoration provided a remarkable roof. May have had detached chapel in churchyard.
Important medieval ironwork, 15th century painted screen, 19th century memorials.
13th century font.
See (S1) and (S2).
E. Rose (NLA), 16 June 2005.

(S3) notes: two aisles, tower with battlements. Five bells, thatched except aisles, north porch, ruined south porch.
'Take all the church of Filby together and tis a pretty building but the jackdaws and pidgeons fowl (sic) it very much. I saw a very nasty sight in the bason of the font vizt. Near a dozen very nasty fowl pipes, with tobacco in a pack and dirty candles ends, put in there by the ringers as I was told, quite shameful'.
Transcribed by E. Rose (NAU) 1982.

Diocesian committee 1987 records 14th century ironwork on north door now inside 19th century porch ? to be made into vestry, etc.
E. Rose (NAU) 29 April 1987.

(S4) notes that a commercial telegraph stood on the tower in 1803.
E. Rose (NLA) 11 April 1997.

For Norwich workshop ironwork see (S5).
E. Rose (NLA) January 2001.

[1] states that in the 1990s when a childrens corner was made at the west end of the church and the pews removed, he found and excavated the top of a brick vault; it is now covered with pamments. He also states that he has excavated the foundations of the demolished south porch.
E. Rose (NLA), 12 June 2003.