Odda’s Chapel at Deerhurst Gloucestershire, a Saxon chapel now built into a medieval timber-framed farmhouse which obscures the eastern chancel (but is itself well worth viewing). The building is a simple two-cell structure with characteristic Saxon long and short quoins. Though very plain inside, it retains the original chancel arch and a number of Saxon windows. Its importance was only recognised in 1885, despite the fact that an important stone inscription was found nearby some two hundred years previous.
“Earl Odda had this Royal Hall built and dedicated in honour of the Holy Trinity for the soul of his brother, Aelfric, which left the body in this place. Bishop Ealdred dedicated it the second of the Ides of April in the fourteenth year of the reign of Edward, King of the English.” [12th April 1056] (A copy of this stone is housed in the chapel, the original being in an Oxford museum).
Odda seems to be a well known figure of the period as Earl of Hwicce and a captain of the Royal Fleet, not to mention, a kinsman of King (Edward the confessor). The stone implies that he and his brother, Aelfric, built (or rebuilt) a large palace complex here Including the chapel. Both men are known to have died at Deerhurst and to have been buried in nearbye Pershore Abbey.
Interesting tree near the path.
LeJogPlod Reader 