Crundale comes from the Old English ‘crundel’ meaning a ‘chalk-pit, quarry’.
Crundale parish church is a Grade: I listed building, dedicated to Saint Mary the
Virgin. The Normans built it in the 12th century, with additions and extensions over
the next 300 years. In 1663, Thomas Palmer cast and hung a bell in the tower. Robert
Catlin added another in 1750, together with a bell cast by Robert Mot, in 1593, for
Wye parish church. In 1798, Edward Hasted described the Crundale church as consisting
of ‘one isle and one chancel, with a tower Steeple on the north side, having a small
pointed low turret on the top. There are three bells in it’. The Victorian architect
Loftus Brock carried out restoration work in 1894. In the same year, Mears and Stainbank
replaced the Thomas Palmer bell.
