CONINGTON,
a parish in the hundred of NORMAN-CROSS, county of HUNTINGDON,
3 miles (S.E. by S.) from Stilton, containing 215 inhabitants. The living is
a rectory, in the archdeaconry of Huntingdon, and diocese of Lincoln rated in
the king's books at £19.6.8., and in the patronage of Dr. Procter. The church,
dedicated to All Saints, is a large handsome structure, having an embattled
tower with octagonal pinnacles, and the windows adorned with stained glass;
it contains many monuments to the Cottons, and an inscribed tablet to the memory
of Prince Henry of Scotland, Lord of Conington, &c. : the font is characteristic
of the Norman and early English styles. The Rev. James Oram, in 1769, left £500
for teaching poor children. At the village, within a square intrenchment, are
vestiges of an ancient castle, which, with the lordship, was given by Canute
to Turkill, a Danish lord, who, taking advantage of his residence among the
East Angles, invited over Sueno to plunder the country. After Turkill's departure
it fell to Waldeof, Earl of Huntingdon, who married Judith, niece to the Conqueror,
from whom it descended to the royal line of Scotland, and thence to the Cottons,
ancestors of Sir Robert Cotton, celebrated for his valuable collection of books
and MSS., known by the name of the Cottonian Library. Sir Robert Cotton, Bart.,
on making an excavation for a pond, found the skeleton of a sea-fish, twenty
feet long, lying in perfect silt, about six feet below the surface of the ground,
and as much above the present level of the fens.
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Last Updated
on: 5 January 2002
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