St Just in Penwith Parish Church

St Just in Penwith Parish Church stands in the small town of St Just in Penwith, Cornwall. Built mainly of granite blocks, the church dates from the 15th century though parts of the chancel remain from an earlier 14th-century building. The tower rises in three stages above the aisles, which share the same design with alternating window patterns. Inside, the arcades rest on limestone piers and the modern font echoes 14th-century style. Two medieval wall paintings survive, one showing St George and the other a warning against breaking the Sabbath. The church holds relics of Saint Justus the Martyr, reported in 1478 by William of Worcester. A late 5th- or early 6th-century stone, the Selus Stone, bears the inscription ‘Selus Ic Iacet’ and is linked to Salomon of Cornwall, also known as Saint Selevan. Several stone crosses from the same period stand in the parish, including two in the vicarage garden and one built into the church wall. A Cornish cross also grows in the vicarage garden at Pendeen. A stained-glass window remembers Owen Boyle, an 18-year-old lighthouse keeper who died at Longships Lighthouse in 1877. Installed in 1879, the glass was made in Dublin by Messrs Eardly and Powell. Nearby Cape Cornwall once had a chapel of St Helen, and Chapel Carn Brea held a chapel of St Michael, both now vanished. The church’s granite tower still overlooks the town and the wider Penwith landscape.