St Michael and All Angels, Colwinston

Sub Wardens

Mrs Liz Stone

Mrs Pam Haines

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Sunday Service

1st & 3rd Sundays of the Month

9.15 am Eucharist

Download the latest Pews News for details of services this week.

This church comprises west tower, nave with south porch and chancel.

Internally, there are indications of the C12th origin of the church in the round-headed chancel arch of Sutton stone. Over the chancel arch are the corbels to support the former rood loft, and the entrance to that loft survives in the upper and lower doorways in the north wall of the nave where the old rood loft staircase is built into the thickness of the wall.

The church contains vestiges of medieval wall painting around the image niches   which flank the chancel arch. Alongside the north niche is the C14th figure of a bishop, identified as St Nicholas of Myrna at his consecration.

Original roof timbers survive in the sanctuary.

In the north wall of the chancel is the moulded arch of a tomb recess. The recess   contains a much worn effigy, probably of C15th (or earlier) date, which does not fit the recess and was presumably moved there from its original location. It shows a man, outlined by the shape of a coffin, wearing a long surcoat reaching to his ankles and with his hands clasped in prayer.

The font is of Sutton stone, its octagonal bowl standing on an octagonal stem

A single pre-Reformation bell survives in the tower. It carries the inscription St Michael pray for us (Sancte Michael ora pro nobis). Originally three bells hung in the tower until two were broken up and sold as metal in the early C18th to pay for the reseating of the church.

Memorials in the chancel commemorate members of the Thomas and Prichard families of Pwllywrach. The south window of the nave contains an inspiring ‘burst of pastel-coloured light’ by John Petts.

The marble wall memorial in the porch commemorates the 23 men of the parish who served in the Great War, all of whom came home.

On the south side of the churchyard survives a pre-Reformation mensa (altar slab). Consecration crosses incised on the stone are now barely visible.

Also in the churchyard are the remains of a late medieval cross-head on a truncated shaft.