The church's size and shape, together with its dominant position in the community, show that it is no ordinary village church, The original church was shown in King Alfred's will (AD 899) as a MINSTER serving as a centre of worship for a very extensive royal estate, and the seat of a community engaged in pastoral and educational Mission, associated with a place of occasional residence for the highly mobile royal household,

The Norman kings continued this arrangement, but donated the church and part of the royal estate to the Augustinian Canons of St Mary at Rouen in Normandy, who erected the present cruciform church about 1130-40, For themselves, the Norman kings, notably King John (1199-1216) erected a series of hunting lodges and a small castle on the crest of Cottington's Hill overlooking Kingsclere, where the Radio and TV mast
now stands,

Almost all the visible external features of the church to day, however, result from a rebuilding in 1848-9, These included the raising of the central tower and the facing of the walls with split flints, Only the circular staircase to the tower retains the original facing of limestone from the Isle of Wight in its lover part,

The War Memorial stands proud in the churchyard

The Churchyard was extended northwards in the 19th century, but the former Golden Falcon Inn, now a private house, still remains to the Northwest, It would have been used as a lodging for royal passengers since Kingsclere lay on the normal road from London to Winchester and Southampton, and was important for industry, where woollen cloth and glove manufacture, rope-making, and brewing took place, It is said that deep scratches made on the beams of the storehouse at the inn were made by falcons' claws, The Falconers, whose arms shoved three falcons with bells and jesses of gold, eere a leading local family from 1400-1700, and donors of much of the church plate, now to be seen on display at the Treasury in Winchester Cathedral, Across the road from the church and Falcons is Priory House, probably on the site of the administrative
centre (curia) Mentioned in Domesday Book (1086),

THE EXTERIOR
The "BUG". The most celebrated feature is the weather vane! Local tradition asserts that King John prevented by fog from reaching his downland hunting lodge at Freemantle stayed at a village inn and was troubled during the night by bed-bugs, He ordered that the church should evermore display on its tower a representation of a dreaded bug, The present vane dates from 1751, but may well be a copy of its predecessor, and perhaps the line goes faithfully back to King John! Other theories are that it represents a tortoise or a dragon,

NORTH DOOR.
 The blocked Norman door, together with a similar one to the south no longer to be seen, used to have a porch, and these were the principal entrances before 1848,

WEST FRONT
 The old Norman door had been replaced by a Tudor one, with a perpendicular window above, The village fire-engine was kept inside, and over the years much damage was done to the doorway, The whole front was replaced by a 'proper' Norman one in 1848,

THE INTERIOR

THE NAVE  The size (67'x21') and austerity of the nave will be noted. It is basically Norman, rebuilt after a fire in 1402, and then remodelled in 1848, when several larger windows previously inserted to admit more light were replaced by small ones to match the remaining Norman windows, The memorials were removed to the Kingsmill Chapel, The tie-beams of 1402 were cut short in 1848 in order to produce a hammer-beam effect, but the walls started to bulge, and so the unsightly metal tie-bars had to be added! The wall-plate frieze of blind arches, now painted green, dates from 1402,

THE WEST GALLERY
smaller than the one it replaced in 1848, now contains the organ moved from the Kingsmill Chapel in 1978, just 100 years after its installation by Bevington & Sons of London, It originally cost £190, and contains some excellent pipe-work,

THE FONT  is 12th century of Purbeck marble ornamented with rosettes, blank arches, arrows and roundels, and a 4-petalled flower, The elegant wooden cover dates from the 17th century from the time when Archbishop Laud required the covering of all fonts. The base is modern,

THE CORBELS
 supporting the brackets of the roof timbers at the easternmost end of the nave are said to represent, on the left, the crowned head of the bearded King Henry IV, and the right, his second wife, Queen Joan of Brittany, wearing a long cap, At the time the nave
was rebuilt by William of Wykeham in 1402, King Henry IV and his entourage awaited the delayed arrival of his bride-to-be in the Kingsclere area prior to the wedding at Winchester,

THE PULPIT  is Jacobean, with a kind of tree of life in the  Main panels, Every available space is carved  with shallow arabesque patterns, including  Tudor roses and egg and dart motifs,

THE CROSSING.
 20ft square, is flanked by plain Norman arches, except for the chancel arch, which has chevron and zig-zag ornament, restored in 1948, The Nave Altar was consecrated in 1966, The Table was made by the children of the secondary school which used to be in Kingsclere on the site of the Health Centre, now replaced by Clere School.

THE CANDELABRUM  is dated 1713 and was the gift of Amey Higham of Beenham Court (now Cheam School), This family was initially associated with the parish for more than two centuries, It hangs from a ceiling. emblazoned with stars, which was the gift of Sir Wyndhan Spenser Portal in 1848, whose initials and family motto appear on the shields in the corners. The bells were formerly rung from a room below the line of this ceiling, but now the ringers ring from a chamber that has no windows and precious little ventilation! The 6 bells of 1664 with a Tenor of 15 cwt were augmented to 8 in 1962,

THE NORTH TRANSEPT
 was dedicated 'The Chapel of the Annunciation' in 1948, The perpendicular north window replaced a plain lancet in 1848, and the west window was newly created as a copy of the east one after that, The glass is the gift of the family of John Porter
who owned the Park House Stables, and shows the Annunciation, Nativity, and Presentation, Look for the representation in the east window of John Porter's most celebrated horse, Oraonde, regarded as one of the finest in English racing history.

THE SOUTH TRANSEPT  has a 15th C window with 19th C glass depicting the Ascension, Since being furnished with an altar and the Book of Remembrance it has been called the Memorial Chapel, It now contains the fine monument to Sir Henry Kingsmill (d 1625) and Lady Bridget (d 1672),moved from the Kingsmill Chapel when that was converted to become the School Room in 1978),

THE CHANCEL
was rebuilt by the Lord of the Manor, Lord Bolton, of the Orde-PovIett family, at the time of the 1848 restoration, The height of the roof and of the east window were increased, and new glass provided, The grisaille glass is a copy of some windows in Salisbury
Cathedral. Note some excellent needlework, especially the High Altar runner, The 'key' to the other kneelers, which were the gift of various local organisations and individuals, can be seen in the North Transept, The Stalls and woodwork were the gift of the Orde-PovIett family, which provided several Vicars with cricketing enthusiasms for the parish in the 19th C. At the vest end and in the Memorial Chapel are two lists of
Vicars which compliment each other in the information they provide,

THE SOUTH AISLE
 unfortunately will normally be found locked, Formerly the Kingsmill Chapel, it is now the Kingsmill School Room, having been converted to provide a meeting place for Sunday
School and many other parochial gatherings in 1978, On the rails are ornaments from the 17th to 20th centuries, Also mounted on the rail are brasses of the 16th C. This aisle was added in the late 15th C, The south windows contain glass depicting the Miracle at Cana and the Transfiguration, The east window is modern, by Lawrence Lee, commemorating Capt Peter Hastings-Bass, former churchwarden, of Park House, and
father-in-law of the present owner; his varied interests can be detected in the motifs worked into the representation of the Creation.

THE SCHOOL ROOM
reminds us that the Sunday School is all that remains of the Kingsclere Free School, This was founded by a former Vicar who died in 1554, In his will he said, "I give and bequeathe one hundred poundes to be leveyd of my plate and other my money, to a priest to teache a Schole in Kingsclere by the space of tenne yere",
This Trust paid for the conversion of the south aisle and provides income for religious education in the parish.
 

THE MILLENNIUM TAPESTRY The overal design plan of the Kingsclere Tapestry has been taken from the waterwheel that was traditionally used to power the mills upon which the economy of the village once depended. The work comprised of 29 cross stitched tiles and a series of quilted panels representing buildings at the traditional core of the village, and cultural and sporting aspects of village life now and into the future.