St Mary's has in its chancel "the most complete set of Romanesque frescoes in northern Europe",[2] including the Christ in Majesty painting created in about 1120.

[3] On the advice of the architect, John Henry Middleton, the renovation plans were dropped and the paintings uncovered and conserved.

[4] Sadly, such attempts to remove "the so-called 'preservative' materials" caused them to darken and to start flaking, said an English Heritage conservator.

[5] In 1999 Francis P. Kelly at English Heritage initiated a dendrochronology test on the oak roof of the church.

[12] The church, dedicated to Edward the Confessor, was built (1903–4) as a chapel of ease by the Lord of the Manor and major landowner, William Lygon, 7th Earl Beauchamp, because St Mary's was too far away from the main centres of population in the parish and liable to flooding.