Kilpeck - St Mary and St David's Church

Until the 9th century the area around Kilpeck was within the Welsh kingdom of Ergyng. After the Norman conquest it became part of Herefordshire. In the Domesday Book of 1086, Kilpeck was given by William the Conqueror to William Fitz Norman de la Mare. The clan de la Mare is one of the oldest in Normandy and is descended from Ragnvald Eysteinsson, earl of Møre and Romsdal.

The village of Kilpeck is renowned for its small but outstanding Norman/Romanesque) St Mary and St David's Church. The church was built around 1140. In 1143 it was given to the Abbey of Gloucester. It may have replaced an earlier Saxon church at the same site, and the oval raised form of the churchyard is typical of even older Celtic foundations. When the church was built, the area around Kilpeck was relatively prosperous and strategically important. The economic decline of the area after the 14th century may have helped preserve features which would have been removed elsewhere. However, it is unclear why the carvings were not defaced by Puritans in the 17th century.

The carvings in the local red sandstone are remarkable for their number and their fine state of preservation. The carvings are all original and in their original positions. They have been attributed to a Herefordshire School of stonemasons, probably local but who may have been instructed by master masons recruited in France by Oliver de Merlimond. He was steward to the Lord of Wigmore, Hugh Mortimer, who went on a pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela in Spain and, on his return, built a church with similar Romanesque carvings at Shobdon, 30 miles north of Kilpeck. Hugh de Kilpeck, a relative of Earl Mortimer, employed the same builders here.