Churches whose older predecessors belonged to Norton Priory

The present Parish Church,Runcorn. rebuilt in the 19thC. This church may be the site of Runcorn Priory, founded in 1115A.D., which was moved to Norton in 1134A.D. It may also be the site of an earlier Saxon church founded by Princess Aethelflaed whose castle was built in 915 A.D., on the edge of the Mersey close by (?) Great Budworth Church. one of Cheshires loveliest Churches. Contains several items which may have once been in Norton Abbey at its dissolution in 1534. Old misericords in Gt Budworth Church Kneesall Parish Church, Nottinghamshire. Dedicated to St. Bartholemew, which incidentally was the dedication of the Runcorn Church at one time Ratciffe-on-Stour, Nottinghamshire, Holy Trinity church Pyrton Church, Oxfordshire. On land which once belonged to the Baron of Halton, which he gave to the Priory. Maybe there was an Anglo-Saxon Church already on this site in those days?

This is an old drawing of the Parish Church before its 19thC. rebuilding. It shows that most of the building had remained unchanged since before the reformation. There was a large choir screen and a double, or maybe triple layer pulpit. The only new building repair was the use of metal columns in the right hand aisle. The arms of Norton Abbey carved on the outside of the tower. An old pre-reformation altar discovered buried in the church grounds, and restored to a place in the church. Burton upon Stather Church, Nth Lincolnshire. Another old altar, probably pre-reformation, in Ratcliffe-on-Stour church This old sundial at Ratcliffe church may have been to show the canonical hours, (when prayers had to be said), of the services in the old church. The monastic rule drawn up by Benedict of Nursia (c. 480 – c. 547) distinguishes between the seven daytime canonical hours of lauds (dawn), prime (sunrise), terce (mid-morning), sext (midday), none (mid-afternoon), Vespers (sunset), compline (retiring) and the nighttime canonical hour of vigil. It links the seven daytime offices with Psalm 118/119:164, "Seven times a day I praise you for your righteous rules"; and the one nighttime office with Psalm 118/119:62, "At midnight I rise to praise you, because of your righteous rules"