Stow Minster

The Minster Church of St Mary, Stow in Lindsey, is a major Anglo-Saxon church in Lincolnshire and is one of the largest and oldest parish church buildings in England. It has been claimed that the Minster originally served as the cathedral church of the diocese of Lindsey, founded in the 7th century and is sometimes referred to as the "Mother Church of Lincolnshire". It is partly Anglo-Saxon and partly Norman in date and is designated by English Heritage as a Grade I listed building and was also included in the World Monuments Fund's 2006 list of the world's 100 most endangered sites. It has the tallest Anglo-Saxon arches of its time in Britain, the earliest known example of Viking graffiti in England (a rough scratching of an oared Viking sailing ship, probably dating from the 10th century), an Early English font standing on nine supports and an early wall painting of the murder of Thomas Becket. Today it is part of the Stow Group of Churches.