Stanmer Church

Stanmer's recorded history goes back to 765, when the village and its lands were given to the South Malling monastery in nearby Lewes by the King of Sussex. The village belonged to the Church for several centuries thereafter, being part of the Episcopal See of Canterbury by the time of the Domesday Book. Ownership transferred from the Archbishop of Canterbury to King Henry VIII during the Dissolution of the Monasteries. A church was built in the Middle Ages; records of it go back to 1232. It had no known dedication, little is known about the building, and the only remnants from the era are some yew trees in the churchyard The church and its associated land were returned to the Archbishop of…

Stanmer Church is in the Early English style. Knapped flintwork was used to build the exterior, although the structural quoins are of stone. The church has a slate roof. Inside, stone walls and carved wooden fittings predominate. Jude Jones, the designated carpenter and estate foreman of the Earls of Chichester and also an active member of the church in the 19th century, designed and constructed all the wooden fixtures. The chancel roof is panelled and has moulded rib vaults and intricately decorated ceiling bosses. The nave roof of four bays also has trefoil-headed panelling. A gallery at the west end houses an organ built in 1839. A plastered stone reredos, also with trefoil-headed…

Stanmer Church was listed at Grade II on 2 November 1954. The wellhouse has a separate listing, also at Grade II; this was granted on the same date. Stanmer Church remains within the joint parish of Stanmer and Falmer. The church at Falmer is dedicated to St Laurence, but it lies across the border in the adjoining local government district of Lewes rather than in the city of Brighton and Hove. The parish covers a mostly rural area, including Stanmer and Falmer villages, the main campuses of the Universities of Sussex and Brighton, and the Falmer–Woodingdean road (B2123) to the edge of the Woodingdean estate. It also extends some way on to the southern face of the South Downs. The parish…