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Hodgeston Parish Church nave is thought to date from the 13th century, while the chancel was added during the following century. The tower was built at a later date. The present windows were added as part of this restoration, but many of the internal features were preserved in the mid-19th century.Â
The church is constructed in local limestone with slate roofs. Its plan consists of a nave with a south porch, a chancel, and a west tower. The massive tower was unusually slender for the era, and is in four stages. On the north face of the tower is a stair turret. In its lowest stage is a 19th-century double west window over the remains of a former narrow window. There are double round-headed bell openings in the top stage, and at the summit of the tower is a parapet supported by corbels. In the north wall of the nave is a blocked doorway.
The chancel measures 9 metres by 5 metres. It has a cornice decorated with ballflowers. Along its south wall is a bench, a double piscina dating from the 14th century, and a triple sedilia; these are decorated with ballflowers, crockets and leaf finials. The carving is of high quality, and was probably paid for by Henry de Gower, Bishop of St David's. The chancel is floored with encaustic tiles. The restored east window is in Decorated Gothic style; the other windows in the chancel are in simpler style. The nave measures about 12 metres by 5 metres and it contains a Norman font. The ground floor of the tower is used as a vestry. The bells date from the 15th and 16th centuries.
References:The Pilgrimage Church of Wies (Wieskirche) is an oval rococo church, designed in the late 1740s by Dominikus Zimmermann. It is located in the foothills of the Alps in the municipality of Steingaden.
The sanctuary of Wies is a pilgrimage church extraordinarily well-preserved in the beautiful setting of an Alpine valley, and is a perfect masterpiece of Rococo art and creative genius, as well as an exceptional testimony to a civilization that has disappeared.
The hamlet of Wies, in 1738, is said to have been the setting of a miracle in which tears were seen on a simple wooden figure of Christ mounted on a column that was no longer venerated by the Premonstratensian monks of the Abbey. A wooden chapel constructed in the fields housed the miraculous statue for some time. However, pilgrims from Germany, Austria, Bohemia, and even Italy became so numerous that the Abbot of the Premonstratensians of Steingaden decided to construct a splendid sanctuary.