Saints' memorial, St Mary of Charity Church, Stone Chapel, Faversham

Pilgrims once came in great number to a holy well dedicated to a Roman-era saint, now lost under the town centre’s high street but part of a matrix of early Christian attractions

Faversham has no less than three reminders of Roman-era belief. While none of them represents a cast-iron link to early Christianity, collectively they tell an intriguing story. For Faversham was home to two famous saints from Roman times – the brothers St Crispin and St Crispinian, martyred around 286.Highlights

• Town of Roman martyrs St Crispin and St Crispinian
• Altar dedicated to saints in parish church
• Ruins of ancient church built on Roman temple

According to medieval tradition, the pair came to Britain to escape persecution in France, and worked for a short time as shoemakers in the Roman town at Faversham. A holy well is said to mark the site of their workshop, but it had vanished without trace when I visited in July 2010. There is only a plaque to mark the location, in the town centre above the  The Swan Cafe – a former pub on Market Street.

According to the plaque, St Crispin’s Well was situated outside The Swan with a handpump over it. I couldn’t even identify where this once stood, though older guides describe an elaborate structure. It must have the oldest Christian tradition of any holy well in Britain, which makes its current absence all the more perplexing. The Oxford Dictionary of Saints records that pilgrims visited this well as late as the 17th century. Someone must know where it has gone. Anyway, a brief visit to see the plaque can be supplemented by a much longer tour of Faversham’s wonderful parish church, which is a short walk away. It is a quieter place to remember the saints, especially since the church dedicated a side altar to them in 2007. They are not technically English martyrs, since they only lived here for a short time and were killed on their return to France. But they pre-date St Alban by a couple of decades so it seems eminently reasonable to commemorate them as the church has done.

Their altar is at the far end of the south transept, on the right as you walk down the building. The church has many other outstanding features, all listed in its colour guide. These include a rare surviving painted column in the north transept, with 13th-century images from the life of Jesus. On the south side of the choir, in the Trinity chapel, is a plaque recording the likely burial place of King Stephen. His remains might have been moved here from Faversham Abbey, which was destroyed at the Reformation.

The misericords (wooden seats) in the choir have medieval carvings underneath, no doubt also salvaged from the abbey. If the names St Crispin and St Crispinian sound familiar, it is because Shakespeare refers to them in Henry V’s famous speech before the Battle of Agincourt:

“And Crispin Crispian shall ne’er go by
From this day to the ending of the world,
But we in it shall be remembered
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers”
(Henry V, act IV, scene iii)

Agincourt was fought on 25 October, the saints’ day. Shakespeare must have known they had greater resonance than a mere coincidence of dates: the pair lived in England but died as martyrs in France.

Unfortunately the oldest documented reference to the saints’ time in England is not much earlier than Shakespeare’s play, a 16th-century tale that has dubious credentials as history. The brothers do at least have a longer pedigree in France: a church was dedicated to them at Soissons during the 6th century. They are remembered in the Anglican and Catholic calendars, though uncertainty about their historical origins is acknowledged.

Stone Chapel

Faversham has one further holy site to augment its Roman-era traditions – though it has no connection to the town’s shoe-making saints. This is a Roman temple that was converted into a church and is now a ruin. Its unique origins are amplified by its unlikely setting, in the middle of a field beside the busy A2 road, a mile to the west of Faversham itself. Enough remains of the walls to make out the shape of the church and its altar. The small Roman section of temple building is in the middle, part of the chancel area of the later church. It is easily identified by the layers of red Roman brick, sandwiched between stone.

The temple dates from the 4th century, and was possibly converted into a church in the 7th century. It was finally abandoned in the 16th century – another former pagan site where Christianity has been and gone. The English Heritage noticeboard says this is the only British example of a Roman temple being incorporated into a later church. That may be true on a technicality, but it seems pretty similar to the pagan shrine at Lullingstone Roman Villa, which had a Christian chapel built on top of it.

Directions

Saints’ memorial

The Swan Cafe, Market Street, Faversham ME13 7AH

W3W: rainfall.grant.blatantly

GPS: 51.3153N 0.8918E

St Mary of Charity Church

Church Road, Faversham ME13 8AL

www.stmaryofcharity.org

W3W: stumps.dame.sensitive

GPS: 51.3171N 0.8945E

Stone Chapel

West of Faversham on London Road(A2) ME13 0RJ

www.english-heritage.org.uk (search Faversham)

W3W: stones.handover.markets

GPS: 51.3161N 0.8564E

The plaque to St Crispin and St Crispinian is easy to find on the front of The Swan Cafe and Restaurant, in the centre of town on Market Street. The church is 400m away: walk along East Street, go straight over at the crossroads and take the first left up Church Road.

Stone Chapel is marked on many maps. It is directly opposite the junction of London Road (the A2) and Faversham Road. You can see it from this road junction. It sits in the middle of a field, in front of a small clump of trees, 100m away down a track.

Note that parking here is impossible: you need to drive past the chapel when coming from Faversham and take the first right, signposted to ‘Historic church’ and Luddenham, where there is a lay-by. Note that the postcode will take you near the northern end of Faversham Road, close to the junction with London Road.