Trimingham church may not be the biggest or most magnificent of the churches in this area. But it does have something that no other church in England has, its dedication. Now, there is no reason to think that the dedications of the majority of English parish churches are necessarily based on anything medieval. The very idea of a dedication was different in medieval times. Churches were dedicated on, and to, feast days, not to Saints as such. The most common dedication in East Anglia nowadays is to St Mary, but this would not have been thought a proper dedication in medieval times. Rather, Marian dedications were to one of her feast days, and perhaps two hundred churches in East Anglia alone were dedicated to the feast of the Assumption by the end of the 15th century. Church dedications fell into disuse after The Reformation.
The aspect of Trimingham church is rather odd. The short, probably unfinished tower is heavily buttressed from the west, while the nave to the east cuts around it to embrace it. This peculiarity may be partly the result of a restoration by Thomas Jekyll in the 1850s. Pevsner feels that he almost completely rebuilt the nave. Perhaps the most notable feature is the way that the tower buttresses on the east side project into the nave.
So how did this splendid dedication at Trimingham come about? In the late medieval period, there was a great devotion to St John the Baptist here. In fact, it was actually possible for English people to go and pray by the real head of the Baptist, as it was kept just across the channel at Amiens Cathedral; indeed, it was kept at at least two other European cathedrals as well. You can still see it at Amiens today.
But rather than make that journey, it was possible to come and pray at the shrine altar here at Trimingham, where a life-sized alabaster carving of the head was on display.
It so happens that one of these alabaster heads survives in the Victoria and Albert Museum.
But evidence of the cult of St John the Baptist survives at Trimingham even today, and this, despite a fairly brutal restoration, is in the form of the rood screen. It is very small, with only four figures on either side of the entrance to the chancel. Who ever restored it replaced the uprights with wider ones, thus curtailing the edges of the panels.
The eight figures, from left to right, are, on the north side, St Edmund with his arrow, St Clare with her book and monstrance, St Clement with his anchor and crozier, and St James in his pilgrim's robes. On the south side are St Petronella with her book and keys, St Cecilia with her garland of flowers, St Barbara with her tower, and St Jeron with his hawk.
All these Saints are widely found on other Norfolk screens, but what makes the screen here remarkable is in the spandrels above the figure of St James. On one side is the Agnus Dei, the lamb and flag which John the Baptist is traditionally shown holding, and there, in the other spandrel, is the Baptist's head on a platter, as shown above left.
The east window is rather striking. Pevsner credits it to H Wilkinson, and dates it at 1925. It depicts Christ in Majesty flanked by St Michael and St Gabriel, with the symbols of the four Evangelists surrounding them. St Michael, curiously, is given a shield with St George's cross on it. The window's deep reds and blues are magnificent, and it is perhaps the very height of Anglican triumphalism before the doubts started creeping in.
Parking is very limited in the village, so it is best to park down the side of the church off the main road down the lane.
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