St Martin's Church, Ancaster

St Martin’s Church stands beside the old Ermine Street Roman road in Ancaster, Lincolnshire, on the southern edge of the Lincoln Cliff. The Grade I listed building sits 10 km north-east of Grantham and belongs to the Diocese of Lincoln. Two churches were recorded here at the time of the Domesday Book in 1086. A hermit’s chapel dedicated to St Mary once stood to the east of the present site. The church register begins in 1722, and the nave was repaired in 1859 under Kirk and Parry. The church mixes Norman, Early English and Decorated styles in Ancaster stone. It seats 220 worshippers and has a west-facing tower with spire, north and south aisles, a chancel and a south porch. The tower holds five bells and battlements, while the spire shows three tiers of lucarnes. Fifteenth-century clerestory windows light the nave, and the chancel screen is partly built into the pews. The four-bay Norman arcade dates from about 1160–70, with circular piers and elaborate arch mouldings. Inside, the font is twelfth-century and the south doorway is Early English. The tower arch belongs to the Decorated style, and the roof carries attached figures from the Perpendicular period. Four stained glass windows in the chancel and two at the west end were given by F. W. Affix. Memorial windows from 1880 and 1904 commemorate the Lloyd family. Outside, Roman sculptures and a milestone of Constantine’s reign lie close by, and the porch holds two early fourteenth-century effigies.