With an ex-cabinet minister dating his correspondence by saints day, and near the eve of All Saints Day, or Hallowe’en, we explore some Norfolk churches with unusual dedications.
Centuries ago Hallowe’en was just the day before, or eve, of the big festival of All Hallows, or All Saints, on November 1.
Norfolk, which has a more medieval churches than anywhere in the world (more than 650) has an abundance of churches dedicated to All Saints – from Alburgh, and Ashwicken to Warham, Waterden, Welborne and Weybourne.
Every one of them is unique, with a quirk of architecture or intriguing tomb or tower, painting or parishioner all of its own. But there is also a clutch of doubly unique Norfolk churches.
They are the only churches in Britain named for their particular saints.
St Gervase and St Protase were twin brothers killed for their faith, in Rome in the reign of Emperor Nero. They are the patron saints of Milan and haymakers but it is not clear how they came to be patrons of Little Plumstead too.
The village just outside Norwich is alone in Britain in having a church of St Gervase and St Protase but the twin saints were popular across Europe and in Germany they became a local version of England’s St Swithin, with an old saying: “When it rains on St Gervase’s' Day, Forty days of rain will follow.”
The church at Woodbastwick, in the Broads, also has a unique double dedication – to St Fabian and St Sebastian, who were early saints who share a commemoration day and a tomb in the Roman catacombs.
Another Norfolk church with a unique dedication is at Bixley, near Norwich. The fire-ravaged ruins of the church of St Wandregesilus stand at the end of track. St Wandregesilus himself was a saintly seventh century French hermit and abbot and the church at Bixley is thought to have once housed a relic of the saint and welcomed pilgrims. His bones are believed to have been dispersed around Europe, including to Norfolk, in an effort to keep them safe from Viking invaders. His only British church was gutted by fire in 2004 and is likely to be rebuilt as a house, leaving just the churchyard accessible for modern-day pilgrims.
The parish church in Bawburgh, near Norwich, was also a pilgrimage church, dedicated to the Norfolk farm worker, miracle worker and saint who died 1,000 years ago. Although St Walstan’s shrine was part of the terrible destruction of the Reformation, his well can still be seen, close to the village church of St Walstan and St Mary.
Another local saint, with a Norfolk holy well and church, is honoured, 14 centuries after her death, in Dereham and at Holkham.
On a hill in Holkham Park, near the famous beach, the church of St Withburga is named for a woman who grew up here in the 8th century. While she was playing on Holkham beach her sandcastle is said to have miraculously become a huge hill which could not be knocked down. The church later built here is the only one dedicated to her.
St Withburga went on to found a monastery at Dereham and another legend includes the story of how her builders were miraculously sustained with the milk of deer. When she died she was buried close by and pilgrims visited her shrine – until her body was stolen by the monks of Ely. In compensation, a spring of holy water is said to have emerged from the empty tomb and St Withburga’s well can still be seen today.
Along the coast from Holkham, the village of Trimingham has a very specific dedication – to St John the Baptist’s Head. It would probably once have contained a carving of the decapitated saint’s head.
Of the six churches dedicated to St Remigius in Britain, four of them are in Norfolk – at Hethersett, Dunston, near Norwich, Roydon, near Diss, and Seething, near Loddon (jointly with St Margaret.) The saint is famous for baptising the King of France on Christmas Day 496. The churches of St Remigius at Roydon and Seething both have round towers dating back to Norman times, when William the Conqueror invaded from France.
There are just three churches nationwide named in honour of St Cecilia, a musical 2nd century saint who was executed for her faith in Rome. St Cecilia’s, West Bilney, near King’s Lynn, is one of them. Its Norman nave and 15th century tower probably replaced a Saxon building and it is looked after by the Norfolk Churches Trust.
The church of the Holy Innocents at Foulsham has another unusual dedication, to the babies murdered by Herod’s soldiers as they searched Bethlehem for newborn Jesus. There is another Holy Innocents church in Suffolk and the Norfolk one is a lucky survival after a store of gunpowder exploded in 1770, destroying most of Foulsham market place.
Norfolk also has two Roman Catholic churches dedicated to local saints and martyrs – the church of St Henry Morse (whose family owned land in Tivetshall) in Diss and the church of St Henry Walpole (born in Docking and tortured and executed for his faith in London) in Burnham Market.
In Norwich, our city with more medieval churches than there are Sundays in a year, there were once still more churches dedicated to rare saints, including Breton St Winwaloy and French St Vedast.
There were once at least three St Vedast churches in England, named for a French bishop. In Norwich just a carved piece of stone in the Castle Museum and a street name between Rose Lane and Prince of Wales Road, remain.
The church of St Winwaloy stood close to the site of Notre Dame High School. It was renamed St Catherine’s almost 1,000 years ago and demolished sometime after 1547.
This week Jacob Rees-Mogg wrote a resignation letter dated not October 25 but St Crispin’s Day.
No Norfolk church is dedicated to St Crispin – although a dedication to the patron saint of shoemakers would have been fitting in Norwich, and perhaps there once was a St Crispin’s church close to St Crispin’s Flyover near Anglia Square.
And perhaps it was lucky for the Roman Catholic MP that did not resign on October 29, or St Narcissus Day.
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