St Mary's Church, Reculver

St Mary’s Church stands on the north Kent coast where the Roman fort of Regulbium once guarded the Wantsum Channel. The 7th-century church was built from stones and tiles taken from the fort’s ruins, its nave and apsidal chancel forming a simple rectangle capped by twin towers added in the 12th century. A pair of north and south porches were added in the 15th century when Reculver was still a prosperous settlement. The church’s early history is tied to Kentish kings and archbishops of Canterbury. King Ecgberht gave the land to priest Bassa in 669, and King Eadberht II was buried here in the 760s. By the 9th century the site had passed between Mercian, Wessex and English rulers and Canterbury’s archbishops. Viking raids may have ended the religious community, yet an early 11th-century record shows monks still served the church when Domesday Book was compiled in 1086. Visitors today see the roofless nave and chancel walls rising from the cliff edge. Two limestone columns from the original triple arch remain in place, and fragments of a high cross are kept in Canterbury Cathedral. The surviving stonework shows Anglo-Saxon church architecture and sculpture at first hand.