It is thought that the unusual alignment of the church may be because it was built on the site of the London Roman Amphitheatre, which was rediscovered as recently as 1988.

[6] The medieval church was destroyed in the Great Fire of London[7] and built anew by Christopher Wren between 1670 and 1677.

[6] The church is entirely faced in stone, with a grand east front, on which four attached Corinthian columns, raised on a basement, support a pediment placed against a high attic.

[8] George Godwin, writing in 1839, described the details of this facade as displaying " a purity of feeling almost Grecian", while pointing out that Wren's pediment acts only as a superficial adornment to the wall, rather than, as in Classical architecture, forming an extension of the roof.

[10] The church suffered extensive damage during the Blitz on 29 December 1940,[11] and after the war the City of London Corporation agreed to restore it as Balliol College had no funds to do so.