Weasenham All Saints / South Wesenham / Wesenham / Wheenham

There are two entries for Weasenham [variant spelling] in the Domesday survey [http://domesdaymap.co.uk/place/XX0000/weasenham-all-saints-and-st-peter/] [accessed 14 February 2014], but neither mentions a church or cleric in it. Blomefield (1805-1810) has references to transactions related to the advowsons of two churches here in William of Warenne, 2nd Earl of Surrey (†1138), "the two churches of St. Peter and St. Paul of Wesenham". Although the above appears to suggest that two churches must have been built here between 1086 and 1138 (at the latest), since the Domesday entries for Weasenham do not mention a church in them [NB: not all churches and clerics were reported in the 1086 survey]; additionally, Blomefield (ibid.) seems to suggest that a church may have existed in an area of Weasenham, "but then it belonged to the lordship of Horningtoft, which extended into Wesenham"; that holding, "I have seen an old writing wherein it is said that Edric held, in the time of the Confessor, 80 acres of land in this town, with a church of 18 acres valued at 18d. and Edric had added to it two socmen; that afterwards Ralph Earl of Norfolk, and the King had the soc, and it was valued at 5s. but at the survey Ralph had forfeited his right, and Godric held it of Alan Earl of Richmond." Furthermore, the 3rd Earl of Warenne, also a William (1119-1148), "confirmed to the monks of Castleacre the advowson of the churches of Wesenham Thorp, All-Saints, and St. Peter's", as did a number of others in the ensuing times, confirmations that are well documented in Blomefield (ibid.) The rectorship of both churches appears to have been held by one person originally, as Blomefield (ibid.) names Roger de Huntingfeld joint rector "in the time of John of Oxford, Bishop of Norwich, about 1190, of All-Saints and St. Peter's." On the church of All Saints in particular Blomefield (ibid.) notes: "This church of All-Saints, called South Wesenham church, has a nave, north isle, and chancel, and a square tower." The font of the original church, or its late-medieval replacement, was probably destroyed when the west tower collapsed in the mid-17th century. The present font, of neo-Perpendicular design, is probably Victorian.