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Anne T visited on 2nd Oct 2014 - their rating: Cond: 4 Amb: 4 Access: 5 Chollerton Cross (St. Giles, Saxon Crosses, Chollerton): It being the most beautiful sunny day with blue skies (but a frosty start), it was a perfect autumn afternoon. Last night I looked through the Anglo Saxon Corpus database and picked out some places within easy reach of my house. My husband and I have been to St. Giles before, on 30th August 2007, but to look at the Roman features incorporated into the church and I had the tiniest little camera which took appalling photographs! The tower was completely scaffolded and three or four men were working at the top of it in the sunshine. Parking by the old mortuary building, as I was changing lenses on my camera an elderly lady came across the road. She said she was waiting for the bus to come down and told me how she and her brothers and sisters used to come and clean the church when they were young; her father had changed the altar cloths and put everything ready for communion. She also told me how lucky they were to have someone as nice as Rev. Slade. I found the Anglo-Saxon crosses on the north wall of the nave easily enough. On opening the door to the porch, there was part of another Saxon cross built into the wall above the door to the church. The sun was so strong it was difficult to get a shot of the church without overexposing the shot, even at 1/4000th of a second. In the guide book, a pretty child’s grave cover is described as sitting next to an 18th century sundial. I found the sundial, but next to it was a bucket of stone fragments. Despite walking twice round the church, I was unable to find this grave cover, so assume it’s either been broken or moved. I was touched by a pair of slippers kept by the font! The guide book says that the church is Grade 1 listed, sited at the southern most end of Chollerton parish, was consecrated in 1097 and is the “mother church” of the parish. The name Chollerton derives from Anglo Saxon (Cholverton, Cholreton, Cholveriton). The guide goes onto say the original church was probably wooden, with the stone church built around 1260 by William de Swinburne a Scottish knight (presumably there are links between his family and Swinburn Castle, with its standing stone) not far away. Part of the 12th century remains in the west walls between the nave and the tower tower and Roman piers have been used to create the south arcade. There is a Roman font inside, dedicated to Jupiter, which has been inverted and modified for use today, although a more modern (13th century!) font with a Jacobean lid is in use today. There is parking for two cars next to the old stable and hearse house with its mounting block, and it is possible to get a wheelchair up to the church (although not around to the north wall of the chancel to see the Saxon stones).

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