St Mary de Haura and St Nicolas: Shoreham’s Norman churches

About St Mary de Haura and St Nicolas: Shoreham’s Norman churches

By the ULTIMATE Brighton Editorial Team

Editor-in-Chief: Jai Michael

Shoreham has two of the finest early churches in Sussex. St Mary de Haura, in the town, was begun around 1125–40 and has some of the finest work of its period in England; St Nicolas, by the river at Old Shoreham, keeps its Anglo-Saxon nave and a Norman tower.

Few small towns can show you two churches like these. One is a great Norman church built for a new port; the other, a mile up the river, is older still. Both are listed Grade I, and both are still parish churches, so check service times before you visit.

St Mary de Haura

St Mary de Haura, “St Mary of the haven”, stands in the middle of New Shoreham, its tall central tower visible from the river and the Downs. The transepts, crossing and lower stage of the tower were built between about 1125 and 1140; the upper tower followed, and the choir was rebuilt on a grander scale, probably between 1180 and 1210. The historian of Sussex parish churches calls it a building that, despite many puzzles, contains some of the finest work of the period in England.

Check opening times and trains on the official sites before you travel.

Inside, look up at the crossing arches, with their scallop capitals of the 1130s and carvings of intertwined leaves and winged beasts, and then walk east into the choir, where the later Norman and early Gothic work rises in tiers. Only part of the first bay of the original nave survives, now the porch: the church you see today is the eastern half of a much larger building.

Built on port dues

The church was planned on a large scale, almost certainly on a new site. The lords of Bramber, the de Braose family, took an interest, but most of the money probably came from the dues paid by ships using the port, which also paid for the far more ambitious choir within sixty years of the first. In other words, the church is a monument to the trade on the Adur.

St Nicolas, Old Shoreham

Up the river at Old Shoreham, beside the old toll bridge, stands the church of St Nicolas. Its aisleless nave is Anglo-Saxon, and the church is recorded in the Domesday Book of 1086. Around 1140 the Normans built a new tower at the east end of the nave and pulled down the old Saxon tower, and you can still see a blocked Saxon doorway towards the north-west end of the nave.

Visiting the churches

St Mary de Haura is on Church Street, a few minutes’ walk from the station and the High Street. St Nicolas stands by the old toll bridge in Old Shoreham, a pleasant walk up the riverside path. Both are working churches, and opening may depend on services and volunteers.

Our advice: visit St Mary de Haura in the morning light, then walk up the river to St Nicolas and the toll bridge, and finish at The Red Lion, Shoreham’s oldest pub in its own words, close by.

Opening hours, prices and seasonal openings change, so please check with St Mary de Haura and St Nicolas: Shoreham’s Norman churches before you go.