FOTCH
FRIENDS OF TRING CHURCH HERITAGE
HISTORY
CHURCH HISTORY
The church at Tring is first recorded in The Doomsday Book as a church and belfry in 1089.
THE PARISH
The Parish Church remains an active place of worship in Tring, part of the “Tring Team Parish”
THE TOWN
Tring nestles on the edge of the Chiltern Hills, at the head of the Bulbourne Valley, overlooking the Aylesbury Vale.
THE HISTORY OF THE CHURCH
The church at Tring is first recorded in The Doomsday Book as a church and belfry in 1089. This would most likely have been a simple rectangular shape and all that remains now are some pieces of masonry incorporated in the east end of the south aisle.
The surviving list of incumbents starts in 1214 with Nicholas de Evesham. According to Pevsner, the earliest surviving architecture is the 13th-century lancet window in the north wall of the chancel, then the 14th century arch from the bell tower to the nave. It is probable the addition of the aisles and bell tower date from this time.
Also in the early 1300s, the Bishop of Lincoln gave permission for an additional chapel in the south aisle dedicated to the Brotherhood of the Blessed Trinity, now the Lady Chapel. The Brotherhood maintained the candles (lights) in the rood screen, separating the chancel from the nave, but also provided a form of poor relief and in their spare time, supported civic improvements in the town.
THE PARISH
The Parish Church remains an active place of worship in Tring, part of the “Tring Team Parish” of the Church of England, which also includes four village churches: All Saints, Long Marston; St Cross, Wilstone; St Mary’s, Puttenham; and St John the Baptist, Aldbury.
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THE HISTORY OF TRING
Tring nestles on the edge of the Chiltern Hills, at the head of the Bulbourne Valley, overlooking the Aylesbury Vale. Sheltered to North and South by the woods and forests of Ashridge and Wigginton, it lies
alongside the Roman Akeman Street – linking London, St Albans, Cirencester and possibly Bath (Anglos-Saxon Acemannesceastre) – at its junction with the ancient Icknield Way – winding from Winchester to Essex, the land of the Celtic Iceni.
A junction of such important old roads implies an equally old settlement, confirmed by archeological finds of Celtic and Roman coins, and Saxon and Viking settlements. The origin of the name of Tring is subject of much dispute: the earliest recorded versions are Tredunga or Treunge in the 11th Century, varying through Trehenge in the 13th, and not until the 15th Century did it appear as Tryng.
The meaning may relate to ‘a third part’ of an area of land, ‘a place of trees’, a Saxon personal name, or even relate to the Celtic Trinovantes tribe whose northern boundary was the Chiltern Hills.
