St Mary's Church, Elsing

St Mary's Church, Elsing
St Mary's church from the south
52°42′27″N 1°02′08″E / 52.7076°N 1.0355°E / 52.7076; 1.0355Coordinates: 52°42′27″N 1°02′08″E / 52.7076°N 1.0355°E / 52.7076; 1.0355
Location	Elsing, Norfolk
Country	United Kingdom
Denomination	Church of England
History
Dedication	Saint Mary
Architecture
Status	Parish church
Functional status	Active
Heritage designation	Grade I
Designated	30 May 1960
Style	Decorated Gothic
Administration
Parish	Elsing: St Mary
Deanery	Sparham
Archdeaconry	Lynn
Diocese	Diocese of Norwich
Province	Canterbury

St Mary's is an Anglican parish church in Elsing, a small village and civil parish in the Breckland district of Norfolk, England. The 14th-century church was built to a single plan in Decorated Gothic style by a local knight and has remained largely unaltered to the present day. The church contains a brass monument of national importance, a tall medieval font cover and rood screen paintings. The chancel retains some stained glass contemporary with the construction of the building.

Elsing is recorded as having a church, endowed with 18 acres (7.3 ha) of land, in the Domesday Survey of 1087. The church was rebuilt by Sir Hugh de Hastings, and his wife Margaret in around 1330 to a single uniform plan. Sir Hugh, whose maternal grandfather was the powerful earl Hugh le Despenser, was summoned to parliament by King Edward III with whom he was on good terms and who seems to have been a mourner at Hugh's funeral, as shown on his memorial brass. Some masonry from an earlier church survives in the west wall of the nave. Wall paintings discovered around 1860 and subsequently plastered over showed four scenes in the story of John the Baptist in 14th-century style. The first scene, which seems to have been hastily plastered over, was said by the rector to have shown Herodias dancing before Herod with her attitude "rolicking and bent to the ground, so that her auburn hair touched the very ground." Of the other scenes which were traced and recorded at the time scene two showed John the Baptist preaching before Herod and Herodias and scene three John coming from the prison watched by Herodias wearing 14th-century style shoes. Scene four was described as the best preserved, showing John about to be decapitated.

Lying on a medieval pilgrimage route to Walsingham the church also venerated St Anne, who is shown teaching the Virgin in a painted rood screen panel. Another panel shows the Visitation, with Elizabeth shown in nun's habit.