Bicester / Bernecestre

There is an entry for Bicester [variant spelling] in the Domesday survey [http://opendomesday.org/place/SP5822/bicester/] [accessed 6 December 2016], but it mentions neither cleric nor church in it. The Guide to the Architectural Antiquities in the Neighbourhood of Oxford (1846) reports a font "plain, polygonal, probably Early English". The Victoria County History (Oxford, vol. 6, 1959) notes: "The tradition that the church dated from the 7th century may be exaggerated, and the architectural evidence for a late Saxon building cannot be accepted without question. [...] That there was a church before the Conquest cannot, however, be doubted, and like the town it probably belonged to Wigod of Wallingford and after him to Robert d'Oilly. [...] The church's early importance is indicated by its relations with the dependent chapels of Stratton and Launton, and particularly with the latter. [...] Moreover, by the end of the 12th century at latest Bicester had given its name to a deanery comprising 33 churches. [...] Soon after 1182 Gilbert Basset, then lord of Bicester and Stratton, gave the church with its dependent chapel at Stratton to his newly founded priory of Austin canons at Bicester [...] At the end of the century, during the incumbency of Thomas Shewring (1691–6), a faculty was sought for 'erecting' a vestry (16 ft. by 16 ft.) and for the removal of the font. [...] The font, a plain polygonal one, probably dates from the 13th century. Early in the 20th century it was raised on two steps and the baptistery was panelled in oak in memory of the Revd. G. P. Crawfurd (vicar 1894–1907) and of his family." [NB: a footnote to the previous text in the VCH (ibid.) reads: "G. P. Crawfurd, Recollections (Reading), 84. For an illustration of the font see Dunkin, Oxon. ii, between pp. 252–3"]. The font is mentioned in Kelly's Oxford Directory of 1911 [http://www.historicaldirectories.org/hd/d.asp] [accessed 30 June 2007]: "the font is plain and polygonal, expanding towards the top and is probably Early English". In Sherwood & Pevsner (1974): "Polygonal and plain; C13?". [NB: In 2005 the font was raised on a two-step plinth; by 2015 the plinth had been removed and the font was resting directly on the ground].