Ancient artefacts on display at Shropshire church - with video and pictures
A George II coin, a 700-year-old peg and human remains were among artefacts uncovered at an historic church.
The 12th century St John the Baptist Church on the Long Mynd recently underwent a £300,000 renovation to save the unique structure.
More commonly known as Myndtown Church, the building, which is Grade II* listed, is a rare surviving example of 12th century farmers’ church, and contains one of the oldest bells in England. It was in danger of a crumbling in 2015, leading to a drive to to preserve it for future generations.
Project manager John Burt said there is now a display in the church filled with items found during the conservation project.
He said: "One really interesting find was a wooden peg from the very early 1300s. We had to remove the inner stone wall in order to rebuild it and when we got to the bottom there was a wooden peg that should have been used in the roof.
"I think it's likely a carpenter would have dropped it from quite a height and wasn't able to retrieve it. I can just imagine him cursing. It's amazing to think we've found something that hasn't been touched for so long."
During the work, it was also discovered that the church has one of the oldest bells in the country.
"The bell was one of the most important thing we discovered during the project," Mr Burt said.
"We had restoration work done on the bell by experts in Nottingham. It's rung for about 900 years so you get a tingle in the spine when you ring it.
"We found lots of other bits and pieces in the church yard because we had to dig drainage ditches. There was odd bits of bones, pottery, coins from a 50 pence piece to a George the Second coin, a hammer and a horseshoe.
"These have all been put into a glass display in the church for everyone to see."
Funded by the Heritage Lottery, the project and its volunteers recently won an award for their hard work and foresight in the first-ever Shropshire Council Design and Conservation Awards.
Planning services manager for Shropshire Council said judges were impressed with the skill and delicacy with which the repairs had been undertaken.
Certificates were presented to the Myndtown project’s architects, Sean Pemble and Andrew Arrol, of Arrol and Snell, contractor Mike Curry, of Phillips and Curry, and project manager John Burt.
Mr Burt said: "We had to make sure it was a conservation project, not a restoration project - they are two very different things.
"It's a unique church because it has not been overly restored and that's what makes it nationally important. We wanted to respect that."
He said the aim was to complete the project without making it look like any work had been done.
"Sometimes people look around and ask what we spent £300,000 on. We've had to be very clever in the way it was done and it was enthralling to see the solutions that came up.
"If you take just one area, I would say the roof is what cost the most. We had to strip off all the tiles and two trusses had to be replaced with oak wood locally sources and made into their curved forms.
"Hopefully the work will keep people visiting now for years to come."
There used to be about 100 people per year using the church but now Mr Burt projects that there will be about 2,000 visiting Myndtown in its first year after more than 500 people attended the opening party last year.
