Panorama taken inside St Nicholas Church in Worth Matravers, Dorset. Image taken late December 2009. The image shows the small, Norman church with carved archways, wooden beam roof and stained glass windows.

St Nicholas Church - Swanage visitor guide showing a virtual tour of 'St Nicholas Church' linked to an interactive map with local and travel information. 360° panoramas from Dorset.

St. Nicholas of Myra church in Worth Matravers is a Saxon church, one of the oldest in Dorset. Most of the building is of a rubble type construction similar to the St Nicholas Church in Studland. This was strengthened by the Normans who added buttresses, changed the interior and added a new roof in the 12th century.

Inside the church there is a beautiful chancel arch, decorated with 2 rows of sharply incised dog-tooth carvings, visible in this image. The image also shows several narrow, arched slit windows filled with stained glass. Much of the church interior is painted white, except for the stonework around the doors and windows. Part of the wood beam roof is also visible.

In the graveyard is buried one Benjamin Jesty who, in 1774, infected his family deliberately with cowpox in a successful attempt to protect them from an outbreak of smallpox. This was the first such use of cowpox vaccination recorded, some 20 years before Edward Jenner promoted the method in 1794.

St Nicholas of Myra Church
Worth Matravers
Dorset.

Bus: Worth Matravers, Worth Matravers Post Office. The church is near the post office.
Road: Worth Matravers 3.7 miles east of Swanage on the B3069 to Coombe Hill and then left down a country lane. It is 3.8 miles south of Corfe Castle.