The Parish Church of St. Martin Le Vieux, Jersey, Channel Islands

There has been a church on this site for 1,000 years or more. The first record is a charter of 1042 in which William, Duke of Normandy, granted to Cerisy Abbey in France, "the (Parish) Church of St. Martin the Old in Jersey, its lands and a third of its corn-tithe"

Slowly the original tiny chapel, on the site of the present chancel, grew into the current structure. First the nave was added and a century later a transept- making the building the shape of a cross. The tower (without the spire) was built. The 14th century saw the south  wall of the chancel opened up and the South Chapel (now the Lady Chapel) added. A century later the south nave was added and the present building was almost complete. An uncompleted chapel to the north of the chancel was started early in the 16th century and eventually finished to a reduced plan 200 years later; and finally the spire- first heard of in 1582- gave us the present church building.

Prior to 1550 and the Reformation, the Church in Jersey, was part of the Roman Catholic Church, and part of the French Diocese of Coutanche. In Febuary 1499 the Pope attached the Church in Jersey to the Diocese of Winchester which remains so today. After 1550 the living became an English Crown Appointment. The English prayer book was translated into French for Jersey. The Church was at one stage was a Huguenot Temple and many of its features destroyed. The chancel was boarded-off and used as the parish school until 1842.

The Beautiful "Ecce Homo" Window at the bottom of the South Nave

The Magnificent East Window depicting the Ascension was restored in 2000 by public donation

The Lady Chapel

The Saint Martin Statue. This wooden statue, presented in 1936 by Lady Trent, wife of Jesse Boot the founder of Boots Chemist.

Beautiful brass lectern

The standards in glass cases on the west wall by the door are those of the St. Martin,s Jersey Mitilia which was disbanded in 1946. A different motif is carved on the end of every pew in the Church.

The Pulpit 

Mosaic panels in the reredos represent the four Evangelists.

The Chancel was boarded off in 1550 and used as the parish school. It was restored 1842.

The Parish Church of Saint Mary, Jersey, Channel Islands

The earliest known mention of St. Mary's church is in 1042, when Guillaume, Duc de Normandie, later William the Conqueror of England, gave to the Abbey of Cerisy in Normandy two "free" churches in Jersey, St. Mary and St. Martin (ecclesia Sancta Maria arsi monasterii et Sancti Martini veteris), with lands and a third of their wheat tithes and their advowsons. The name, St. Mary of the Burnt Monastery, suggests that the church was built on, or near the actual site of a primitive monastery which was destroyed by pirates. The fire, at whatever date it occurred, would have made building, or rebuilding, a matter of urgency.

It seems likely that this monastery at St. Mary was a daughter establishment of the known monastic centre in Sark, founded in about 570 by St. Maglorius (St. Mannelier) within sight and comparatively easy reach of the St. Mary coastline.

Lady Chapel (North Chancel) with remains of Norman Windows in the East Wall.

The evolution of the church building can be seen from the above photograph. In the earliest portion, the present north-east chapel, traces of two windows of the 11th or early 12th century date and of clear Norman type, were exposed on the east wall in 1978. This highly important discovery shows the only known instance of Norman windows in an east end in a local parish church.

South Chancel and High Altar 

Also revealed during the re plastering in 1977 was the piscina (on the right in this photograph) circa, 1342. Also an aumbry (on the left in this photograph). There are granite brackets on the east end wall which would have supported statues before the Reformation, possibly of the Blessed Virgin Mary and St. John.

View showing the vaulted roof.

The vaulted roof is of interest. The north, the oldest part, is supported with strong ribs at intervals, approximating to the buttresses on the outside, and this part of the roof is noticeably higher than the later, southern part.

Pews

The present pews, made of Gothenburg pine and were installed in 1865.

A large oak plaque, carved in relief.

In 1973 a large oak plaque, carved in relief, was presented by Major amd Mrs Gordon Rice and accepted by the Ecclesiastical Assembly for errection in the Parish Church. It depicts Christ and St. Margaret Mary, the 17th century nun and visionary of Paray-le-Monial who emphasised the love of Christ by encouraging devotion to His Sacred Heart.

A Lesser Known Character of the Reformation...

Ioan Iacob Heraclid (or Eraclid) (1511–1563), also known as Jacob Heraclides, was a Greek soldier and ruler of Moldavia from November 1561 to November 1563, most notable for being the first officially Protestant monarch in Eastern Europe.

Jakob Heraklides was a Greek solider of fortune from the Aegean Island of Samos, who made a career in western European armies and became fascinated by Latin Europe and western Christianity. Clearly charming and charismatic, he won the good opinion of Philipp Melancthon (German Reformer) during time in Wittenberg and he successfully served in Charles V's (Holy Roman Emperor, indeed Habsburg world monarch) armies and in Poland-Lithuania. His contact with the Reformed magnate family of Radziwill encouraged him away from his enthusiasm for Lutheranism, and it was also Prince Mickolaj Krzysztov of Radziwell who recommended him to service of the Voivode (Prince) of Moldavia  Having arrived there, Heraklides scented an opportunity to harness discontent against a ruler who was widely hated for collaborating with the Turkish Empire. Creatively drawing on his varied acquaintance in the West, he led an army backed by both the Habsburgs and by Lithuanian magnates, and in 1561 he succeeded in his bid to take over Moldavia, taking the Greek title of Despot. He paid tribute to the Turkish Sultan and saw himself as a champion of Christianity, and most remarkably he saw himself as a Protestant Christian and he regarded the religion of his birth with contempt.

Heraklides ordered Protestant worship at his Moldavian Court, appointed a Polish Reformer as Bishop, and called scholars from all over the Protestant World. Some were optimistic enough to accept the invitation, which was a mistake, because Heraklides' rule was rapidly undermined by his genuine and urgent commitment to Reformed Protestantism, in a land which knew only small communities of non-Moldavians not owing loyalty to the Orthodox hierarchy of bishops. If anything destroyed this monarch, it was the issue that seperated the Reformed from everyone else- their hatred of scared images. In the Despot's need for cash to support his government and army he plundered Orthodox monasteries, not exempting various precious metal crosses which were regarded with particular veneration, or worse still, the precious metal frames of icons; out of this bullion he minted a coinage which as was customary, bore his portrait.

Nothing was more calculated to enrage the Orthodox population, because it recalled for them the iconoclastic disputes which had torn apart the Byzantine Empire nearly a millennium before. Those ancient destroyers had denounced images, but showed no problems with the portraits of monarchs on coins: this inconsistency had been seen as a symptom of their wickedness by the victorious champions of icons. Now the same rhetoric was turned on Heraklides by the leaders of the Orthodox Church.

When Heraklides married the daughter of a great Polish aristocrat, rather than a Moldavian, his fate was sealed. His army melted away and he was butchered without mercy, as was the hapless widow of the late Polish bishop and anyone else whom the infuriated Moldavians decided was a Protestant.