Page:Sussex archaeological collections, volume 9.djvu/116

90 If you are not conversant with medieval architecture, be careful before you remove a single stone, or even before you call in the aid of your architect, to consult some experienced antiquary who knows your church and has studied its minutest features. Such a person will generally have a keener perception of what ought to be retained, than the professional church-builder, who is not unfrequently biassed by his own views of the beautiful and of the structurally convenient, to say nothing of the flights of fancy and the violent anachronisms, in which some of that fraternity occasionally indulge.

These remarks have not been called forth by any proceedings connected with this locality. Of the two churches brought under our notice to-day, one stands much in need of restoration ; the other has been partially rebuilt without the injury of a single ancient feature.

Of the history of Newhaven church little is known. Newhaven is a comparatively modern name, having originated within the last three centuries, and since the river Ouse has been made to debouche here, instead of, as formerly, at Seaford. The ancient name of the parish, and manor, Meeching, though clearly of Saxon origin, is not mentioned in Domesday Book. The place must however have been of some little importance in Norman times, since the church clearly belongs to that period. The first mention of the church I have met with, is in the Taxatio Ecclesiastica of Pope Nicholas, 1291, in which its annual revenues are rated at £5. 6s. 8d. Fifty years later, namely in 1341, we find the following notice of it in the Nonaæ return :—

"This indenture testifieth, that an inquisition was taken before Hen. Husè and his fellow collectors, venditors, and assessors of the ninths of sheaves, fleeces, and lambs, and the fifteenths assigned to our lord the King in the county of Sussex, at Lewes, on the sabbath day next after midlent Sunday, in the fifteenth year of King Edward, the Third of that name after the Conquest of England, and the second of his reign over France, upon the true value of the ninths of sheaves, fleeces, and lambs, according to the tenor of the commission of our lord the King to the said Henry and his fellows directed,