Knightwick / Chenitwica / Cnihtawiche / Cnihtewac / Cnihtewica / Knhittewyk / Knyghtewcike / Knythwyk

There is an entry for Knightwick [variant spelling] in the Domesday survey [http://domesdaymap.co.uk/place/SO7355/knightwick/] [accessed 25 September 2014], but it mentions neither cleric nor church in it. Noakes (1851) reported the font here as semi-circular, massive, and entirely devoid of ornament. Miller (1890) reports the church built in 1855, but the first recorded rector of the earlier church is given as "Johanes Bocer ... 1314". The Victoria County History (Worcester, vol. 3, 1913) notes: "The advowsons of the chapels of Knightwick and Doddenham were given by Simon de Mans about 1177 to the Prior and convent at Worcester for the souls of his father and mother and himself. [...] The church of ST. MARY THE VIRGIN, built in 1856 at Knightsford Bridge in Doddenham, serves for both Knightwick and Doddenham, and will be described with the latter parish, which is in the hundred of Doddingtree. The site of the previous church is on a small hill about a mile to the east of Knightsford Bridge. It was an old black and white timbered structure with a fine wooden porch, and was pulled down by John Francis Greswolde-Williams in 1879, and a mortuary chapel built on its site in the churchyard. On the floor of the chapel is a portion of the circular bowl of a 12th-century font with wide lines of zigzag ornament." English Heritage [Listing NGR: SO7282855232] (1984) reports the "remains of Norman font with chevron detail" in the 1879 mortuary chapel. The CRSBI (2014) reports two fonts at Knightwick and Doddenham, one whole, one a fragment; of the fragment located in the mortuary chapel at Knightwick it writes: "This was once round and cup-shaped according to a 19thc. drawing, but great pieces have been knocked out of it and all that remains is the bottom half of the bowl with an irregular rim. It is decorated with horizontal bands of chevron, alternately thick and thin rolls. What is left of the font is now preserved in the chapel", and provides the measuments of that fragment [NB: the fragment does not show the whole height or inner and outer diameter of the upper rim; the maximun height of the basin piece is 51 cm; the maximum diameter is 80 cm; these figures may give an idea of the whole font. The remaining outer sides of the fragment are completely covered in a pattern of nested chevrons.