Oxford St Mary the Virgin

"St. Mary's the Virgin is a discharged vicarage, valued at £5. 4. 2.; net income, £38; patrons and impropriators, the Provost and Fellows of Oriel College. The church, which is the university church, though used by the parishioners, is a spacious and elegant structure in the later English style, with a tower in the decorated style on the north side, surmounted by a beautiful spire, ascending to a height of 180 feet. The front of the building is in the best style of the period of Henry VIII., but rather disfigured by a porch of heavy twisted figures, over which is a statue of the Virgin. The interior is very beautiful; the piers and arches are richly moulded, and above the piers are elegant niches, from which spring corbels, supporting the wooden arches of a finely-carved ceiling; on the north of the chancel is the sepulchral chapel of Adam de Brome, founder of Oriel College, and there are several ancient and interesting monuments. At Littlemore, in St. Mary's parish, is a separate incombency." [Samuel Lewis. A Topographical Dictionary of England (1848)]