The church sits across the line of the wall of Roman Eboracum, and the first church on the site was probably built before the Norman Conquest, as a fragment of an early 11th-century cross has been found in the wall of a house on Newgate, within the former churchyard.

Foundations of a Norman wall have also been discovered underneath the present church.

The church was first recorded in 1154, and from 1394 the advowson belonged to the Vicars Choral of York Minster.

In 1644, the tower was damaged during the English Civil War, and the Parliamentarian troops subsequently destroyed most of the monuments in the church.

[2][3][4] Between 1845 and 1848, most of the church was rebuilt by Frederick Bell but kept with the Gothic style, and a vestry was added.