Now practically a suburb of Derby, it had for centuries a great share in the beauty of England, for the alabaster quarried in its hillside has added to the glory of a thousand homes and churches.
Here was one of the chief quarries of the Middle Ages. Its deep deposit of alabaster (a kind of sandstone containing lime) covered a wide area and was much worked. Some of the most gorgeous alabaster tombs in the country came from these quarries, and flourishing schools of carvers grew up at Nottingham and Burton-on-Trent.
It was here that the practice of putting on tombs small angel weepers holding shields. These first appear about 1390, and are characteristic of the Trent valley workers.
All that is left of the 12th century church here is the great bowl of a Norman font set on a new base 600 years ago. The chancel arch, the nave arcade, the doorway and windows of the nave and aisles are of the late 13th century. The chancel was made new in the 15th century and enlarged last century; the tower was rebuilt in 1842.
It is said that many memorials from the old church were used by a churchwarden to make a stable floor, but two 16th century mutilated floorstones remain. They are in memory of the Bancroft family, who gave the neighbouring village of Swarkestone its 17th century poet, Thomas Bancroft.
