THE CHURCH OF ST. LAURENCE-NORWELL

The parish church of Norwell is dedicated to St. Laurence who was martyred on a gridiron in Rome in the year 258, he can be seen in the left hand panel of the East window and in a statue above the porch.

There was a church, with a priest, in the village at the time of the Domesday survey but this could have been a wooden one and no trace of it survives.

The south doorway through which you enter the church is one of the oldest parts of the church; it has typical Norman carving and probably dates from the mid l2th century. The pillars supporting the arches are circular on the south side and octagonal on the north. This suggests that the south aisle was added before the north aisle, the south aisle dating from the late 12th century and the north aisle from the 13th century. The most westerly pillar in the north arcade shows traces of what was an earlier church, possibly the first stone church.  It also contains a piece of Anglo Saxon cross.

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