Services

Saint Nicholas stands well outside the village besides an ancient track formerly known as Bledington Road or Jail Lane. As these is no electricity supply to this ancient building, services at St. Nicholas are limited to the summer months and two candle-lit December services on St. Nicholas' Day and Christmas Eve.

The Village

The road through the village is an ancient route from the Evenlode river towards Icomb Hill and remained the main highway until the building of the turnpike (now the A436) in the middle of the 18th century. In the Middle Ages Oddington was a staging post with at least seven inns. Henry III often stopped here when travelling between Woodstock and Evesham, Tewkesbury, or Gloucester. By the end of the 16th century the village had relocated north from the old parish church to create Lower Oddington, and subsequently a secondary settlement of Upper Oddington emerged, initially around the now depleted green at its lower end. Inclosure in 1787 reduced the green to the narrow triangle beside the road it is today. The villages grew in the 19th century with some larger houses and a new church and school between the villages reduced the gap between them, with further building, including 24 council houses opposite the church, in the 20th century. Its population remained between 100 and 150, from the end of the 11th to the end of the 16th century. It peaked at 588 in 1861, and was 380 (in 180 households) in 2018.

The Parish

Oddington was acquired by St. Peter's Abbey, Gloucester, soon after its foundation in 681. On the grounds of his expenses in rebuilding the abbey (but rather, it was suggested, because of his extravagance in entertaining), Ealdred, Bishop of Worcester, was allowed by the abbot to take the rents of Oddington for a term, and he continued to do so after his translation to the see of York in 1061: by 1086 it seems to have become accepted as one of the possessions of the see. During the 13th century the manor was one of the archbishop's residences and archbishops continued to reside here occasionally until the mid 14th century. It remained one of the Archbishops of York’s manors (including Cardinal Wolsey, though there is no evidence that he visited) until ceded to the Crown in 1545. York remained patrons of the living, a rectory, until it was transferred to the Bishop of Gloucester in 1871. In 1937 the rectory was united with that of Adlestrop and in 1968 with Broadwell and Evenlode. The current benefice was established in 2004, drawing in Bledington, Icomb and Westcote.

In 1535 the living yielded over £20; the glebe included about 30 acres dispersed in the common fields, and the tithes were unusually comprehensive. Crops were tithed in the fields, and the rector's servants collected tithe milk by milking the cows every tenth day. The net annual value of the rectory was over £340 in 1851, so the living was thus a relatively comfortable one.

The rectors mainly lived in the parish, but occasionally outside. In the late 15th and early 16th century the parish appears to have had a curate in addition to a resident rector. In 1551 the rector lived outside the diocese, and Oddington was served by a “curate of little learning”. The parish was not immune to the Civil War conflict. Rector John Vade was deprived of his living in 1646 for giving the king's soldiers a hogshead of ale at Stow and badges or decorations for their hats. His successor, William Tray, who later became a schoolmaster and Congregational minister, was described in 1650 as a 'constant preaching minister'. After the Restoration, attendance in church fell away. Oddington was served in 1740 by a curate who published his sermons and tried with little success to persuade the villagers to receive Holy Communion and behave reverently in church.

The Church of St Nicholas

There was a church in Oddington by the 12th century, and part of its fabric has survived. In 1852 a new church was built midway between the two villages, and from then on the old church was used only for funerals. In 1913 the building was restored, and used again for occasional services. The maintenance of the old church has benefitted from charitable bequests and today supported by the Friends of St Nicholas. The church is a Grade I listed building, one of three in the benefice.

St Nicholas, a building of rubble masonry partially roofed with local stone, was built at various dates from the 12th to the 15th century, and has an unusual plan comprising chancel, nave, south aisle, south porch, and south-east tower.

The oldest part of the church is the south aisle, which was built in the 12th century, and the most likely explanation of the plan of the church is that the south aisle was the original nave. When the king and archbishop began to frequent Oddington the church was found too small; and it was enlarged by building new nave and chancel on the north side.

The south aisle (the original church) dates from the 12th century, though the porch and windows are later.

At the east end of the south aisle is the 13th-century tower, and both aisle and tower are separated from the nave by a 13th-century arcade. The south porch was added in the 14th century. The top stage of the tower, the west window and the roof of the nave, and the font are 15th-century.

The western half of the north wall of the nave is painted with the late 14th century doom, one of the most notable representations of the Last Judgement now surviving in the country (see below). Traces of other mural decoration survive in the chancel and tower, and on the arcade. Interior alterations were made in the period 1624–30; these included the provision of a gallery at the west end of the nave (since removed), and probably the building of the Jacobean pulpit on the north wall. At about the same time, the interior was whitewashed and this concealed, until 1913, the existence of the medieval paintings. The coloured glass in the windows was also a casualty of the Commonwealth.

The Jacobean pulpit dominates the nave and is surrounded by wall paintings. The window on the left was once the north entrance. The arms of William IV stand over the chancel arch.

The chancel, which is buttressed, has three separate cinquefoil lights, flanked by a pair of cinquefoil niches, in the east wall, and two tall lancets, with square-headed reveals, in each side wall. The chancel arch and the south arcade of the nave are 13th-century, but the arch opening on the tower is of three orders whereas the chancel arch and the two opening on the aisle are of two. The arches to the aisle, moreover, are supported on a composite pier and responds with octagonal or semi-octagonal moulded capitals and bases with plinths, whereas the arch to the tower springs, at a lower level, from a half-round capital at the east side, and at the west side dies into the wall separating the tower from the aisle. The altar table is 17th-century, the Communion rails 18th-century. The 15th-century font is octagonal with sculptured faces to the bowl, chamfer, and pedestal. Two 18th century hatchments hang in the church, both of Reade impaling Hoskyns.

The simple 12th-century door of the south aisle is flanked by a pair of 14th-century windows of three lights with reticulated tracery; high up in the west wall is a lancet.

The walls of the tower are nearly 4 ft. thick. Possibly the tower was placed in its unusual position simply because, with the building of a new chancel, the former chancel provided a good base. The 13th-century archway from the aisle to the tower has been filled with masonry (to help to support the tower) leaving only a narrow round-headed entrance. In the east wall is a plain 13th century piscina, indicating that the base of the tower was used as a chapel. Possibly it was once the chancel, or was built on the foundations of the chancel. The lancet in the east wall of the lowest stage is slightly north of the axis of the tower and aisle, and may be in line with the old ridge marked on the gable-end of the south aisle.

The tower has a plain 13th century piscina, indicating that it was used as a chapel. The bells were rehung in 1973 thanks to a gift by Miss Constance Woodwood.

St Nicholas has a peal of six bells, plus a sanctus. By 1973, only three remained, one tuned to B dating from 1684 by Abraham Rudhall of Gloucester, the earliest year in which Rudhall is known to have made bells, another, tuned to G, by William Bagley of Chacomb c. 1700 and the third, tuned to C, by Abel Rudhall dated 1738. Two new bells, tuned to A and D, from the Whitechapel Bell Foundry were added and the old bells tuned and re-hung with new fittings and framework in 1973. A new tenor Whitechapel bell, tuned to E, was added the following year, restoring the peal its status at the turn of the 18th century.

The 14th-century porch has three scratch dials on its western jamb, probably used to indicate the times of services.

The Doom

St Nicholas’ is famous for its wall painting of the Last Judgement. This and other wall paintings, including the Acts of Mercy and the Seven Deadly Sins, were whitewashed over at the Reformation. Having been discovered in 1914, they began to fade of the following fifty years until they were conserved by Eve Baker from 1969. A grant from the Pilgrim Trust in 1970 financed further stabilisation of the paintings.

The painting of the Last Judgement is badly faded.

This reconstruction show the vivid colours which would have been visible in c. 1340 when the image was first revealed.

At the top centre of the painting is a figure of Jesus, flanked by apostles and saints, and below this are two angels sounding a trumpet to waken the dead. The bottom of the image shows the dead rising from their graves to be judged. Those on Christ's right hand are awaiting admittance at the gates of heaven, while those on his left hand are being dragged into hell, where a fearsome figure of Satan surrounded by his imps awaits them.

In 1340, mineral pigments (red ochre, yellow ochre, umber, lime white) were readily available and cheap. The pigment would be mixed with egg and water to make a paint. Green would have been green earth from Verona in North Italy and Azurite would have provided blue. Although Ultramarine was available, the high price of the pigment, sourced in Afghanistan, meant that it would only have been used by wealthy patrons.