St John the Baptist Church is a parish church in Cardiff, Wales, the oldest church dating to pre-Medevial times in Cardiff city centre.
The church was built in 1180 as a chapel of ease for the larger St Mary's Church, itself founded by Benedictine monks from Tewkesbury Abbey. Originally constructed of blue Lias, a Jurassic stone with layers of fossilised shells, it was sourced from Aberthaw. The walls were then origianlly dressed with an Oolitic freestone sourced from Dundry.[1]
Not originally built with a bell tower, the church was refurbished in the 15th Century and given a perpendicular tower with a peal of ten bells. Today it still has a crown of openwork battlements, reminiscent of churches in the West Country of England, and is dated c.1490 when the similar Jasper Tower of Llandaff Cathedral was also built.
After the foundations of St Mary's were destroyed by the Bristol Channel flood of 1607, the two churches were worked as a dual-location parish until all main services were moved to St John in 1620.
In 1843, John Crichton-Stuart, 2nd Marquess of Bute paid for the construction of the Church of St. Mary the Virgin and St. Stephen the Martyr in Bute Street as a permenant replacement for St Mary's.[2] This allowed the reconstruction of St John, with extensions to the church made in 1886-1897 using carboniferous limestone quarried from Culverhouse Cross. The churchyard wall was also was also rebuilt, using original Lias mixed with red sandstone in the walls, topped with coping stones of Devon sandstones from the Forest of Dean.[1]