Our History
Saxon Times
The legend of Cuthman tells of the shepherd boy who, in the centuries before the Norman conquest, wheeled his ailing mother in a wheelbarrow, with a rope around his shoulders attached to the handles of the barrow to help take the weight. When the rope — made from willow (‘withies’) or elder stems — broke, Cuthman took that as a sign from God that that was where he had to build his church. If Cuthman or his family were converted to Christianity by St Wilfrid, the ‘Apostle of Sussex’, these events would have taken place not long after Wilfrid became the first Bishop of Selsey (before the see moved to Chichester), in 681.
There is no archaeological evidence of Cuthman’s original wooden church and it is probable that the present largely Norman church stands on the site. After his death Cuthman’s burial place in the church became a place of pilgrimage. Steyning then grew in importance and became a royal manor of the Wessex kings. King Ethelwulf, father of King Alfred, is recorded as having been buried in Steyning church in 858. His remains were later transferred to Winchester.
Before & After 1066
In 1047 Edward the Confessor granted Steyning church and manor to the Benedictine monastery of Fécamp in Normandy. Later Earl Godwin (father of King Harold) repossessed the church but, after Harold’s defeat at Hastings in 1066, it reverted to the monks at Fécamp. Edward’s gift was confirmed by William the Conqueror in a charter of 1085. By the following year, the population across Beeding, Bramber and Steying was amongst the largest 20 per cent of settlements recorded by the Domesday survey.
Fécamp Abbey came under the direct ecclesiastical jurisdiction of the Pope and thus Steyning church, as a possession of the Abbey, also came under that jurisdiction and did not answer to any bishop of the English Church. This was confirmed in 1290 by Edward I. The Abbey established a college of secular canons when the building of the present church began in 1090. The carvings on some of the pillars and arches have led experts to suggest that there was a pilgrimage processional route down the south aisle, across the east end to St Cuthman’s shrine in the north transept. Cuthman’s relics were translated to Fécamp Abbey, probably not long after the Norman conquest. As a result his feast day was celebrated by many religious houses on the Continent, and in 1658 his life was set down in Acta Sanctorum.
Henry’s Reformation
After the dissolution of the monasteries in 1534 the east end of the church fell into decay leading to demolition of the chancel, crossing tower and transepts in 1602; a new tower was erected at the west end of the church during the reign of Elizabeth I or her successor, James I.
Click here to find out about our historic TUDOR PANELLING—carved five-hundred years’ ago to commemorate the marriage of Catherine of Aragon to Henry VIII in 1522—and the story of how it came to be hidden away in Steyning after the Reformation.
Modern Times
Until abolished by the great Reform Act of 1832, Steyning and Bramber continued to be ‘rotten boroughs’, each electing two MPs to the House of Commons, latterly with only 135 voters.
In the mid-eighteenth century the chancel at Steyning was rebuilt. In 1863 the present three-light window from the Hardman Workshops three-light window from the Hardman Workshop was installed within a new east wall and the enormous twin buttresses were constructed either side of the chancel arch to stave off collapse. Galleries, installed earlier in the nineteenth century, were removed in 1906 when further re-ordering was done. The east end was opened up in the 1970s when a new organ was installed at the west end of the nave, with new vestries created under the tower.
After the Reformation the appointment of the priest at Steyning had become the prerogative of the crown and, at some stage, the patronage passed into private hands. In 1882 the patronage was owned by a Mrs Congreve-Pridgeon who, in 1919, transferred the right to the Martyrs Memorial Trust. In 2011 the right to appoint the Vicar was transferred by the Trust to the Bishop of Chichester. Click here to find out about recent research undertaken on previous vicars of Steyning.
In earliest times the church was known as Cuthman’s church but it has been dedicated to the apostle St Andrew since at least the Norman era. The pilgrimage to Cuthman’s shrine continued to be encouraged as a pious devotion. In the twentieth century there was a renewed interest in the Cuthman story which resulted in the Parochial Church Council petitioning the Diocesan Bishop in 2007 to change the dedication of the church to St Andrew and St Cuthman.
Further Information
Click here to follow an AUDIO TOUR of our building where you will discover further aspects of its history. Click here for a 360-DEGREE visual tour, and here for information about our stained glass.
OUR ARCHITECTURE is described in more detail on the Sussex Parish Churches website. Slides and photographs from a 2014 lecture about our NORMAN CARVINGS by Professor Malcolm Thurlby of the University of York in Toronto can be downloaded from the Steyning Museum website here.
Souvenir Guide Book £4
A fuller account of the history and a description of the building can be found in our excellent, full-colour souvenir guide book.