page_title: Denchworth
section_title: Parish church
hierarchical_section_title: Denchworth / Parish church
caption_attribution_description: English: St James the Great parish church, Denchworth, Oxfordshire (formerly Berkshire), seen from south-southeast
context_page_description: Denchworth is a village and civil parish about 2.5 miles north of Wantage. It was part of Berkshire until the 1974 boundary changes transferred the Vale of White Horse to Oxfordshire. The 2011 Census recorded the parish's population as 171.
  The parish is bounded by the Land Brook in the west and the Childrey Brook in the east. The Great Western Main Line between Reading and Swindon runs through the parish just south of the village, but there is no station.
context_section_description: Denchworth had a parish church by 1086, but the oldest part of the present Church of England parish church of Saint James is 12th century. This is a small part of the south wall of the nave, which seems to have been rebuilt and extended westwards in the 13th century. The south doorway is a plain late Norman arch.
  Later in the 13th century the north chapel and the north-west tower were added. The south transept was added in the 14th century and was originally Decorated Gothic. The chancel, north chapel and possibly the south transept were rebuilt in the 15th century, mostly with Perpendicular Gothic windows. The church was restored from 1852 onwards. It is a Grade II* listed building.
  The Perpendicular Gothic font is also 15th-century. The Perpendicular-style pulpit is neo-Gothic and was made in 1889.
  The south porch is neo-Gothic and was added during the 19th-century restoration. It replaces a two-storey south porch, in whose upper room Gregory Geering and the then vicar established an antiquarian chained library. Its contents included a 1483 edition of the Golden Legend that is now in the Bodleian Library in Oxford and other rare volumes that were transferred to Denchworth vicarage. The library also held curiosities such as a "mermaid's rib".
  The church has monumental brasses to Oliver Hyde (died 1516) and his wife Agnes, to William Hyde (died 1557), his wife Margery and their children, and to another William Hyde (died 1567) and his wife Alice. One of the inscriptions for William and Margery Hyde has a commemorative plaque for the foundation of Bisham Priory in 1333 on the back. In the south transept is a memorial tablet to Gregory Geering (died 1690) and four more to members of the Geering family who died in the 18th century.
  The tower has a ring of four bells, but they are currently unringable. Ellis I Knight of Reading, Berkshire cast the treble bell in 1624. Henry III Bagley, who had bellfoundries at Chacombe in Northamptonshire and Witney in Oxfordshire, cast the second bell in 1733. The remaining bells are from the Whitechapel Bellfoundry: the third bell cast by Robert Stainbank in 1868 and the tenor bell by Mears and Stainbank in 1869. St James' has also a Sanctus bell cast by an unknown founder in about 1699.
  St James' parish is now a member of the Vale Benefice, along with the parishes of East Challow, Grove and West Hanney.
caption: St James' parish church from the southeast, showing the chancel, south transept and churchyard cross
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