Nun Monkton
| Nun Monkton | |
|---|---|
 The duckpond and maypole on the village green, Nun Monkton |
|
 Nun Monkton
|
|
| Nun Monkton shown within North Yorkshire | |
| Population | 173 (2011) |
| OS grid reference | SE509578 |
| District | |
| Shire county | |
| Region | |
| Country | England |
| Sovereign state | United Kingdom |
| Post town | YORK |
| Postcode district | YO26 |
| Police | North Yorkshire |
| Fire | North Yorkshire |
| Ambulance | Yorkshire |
| EU Parliament | Yorkshire and the Humber |
Nun Monkton is a village and civil parish in the Harrogate district of North Yorkshire, England. It is situated 8 miles (13 km) north of York at the confluence of the rivers Ouse and Nidd. Cottages and houses are grouped around a village green of 20 acres (81,000 m2) with a duck pond and a maypole. The Ouse is navigable for another 19 miles (30 km) and river traffic played an important part in the village's life until the middle of the twentieth century.
Until 1974 Nun Monkton was in the West Riding of Yorkshire.
Some sort of settlement has probably existed since the earliest times. The name "Monkton" appears to reflect a pre-Viking or Anglian settlement in the 8th and 9th centuries. The village is mentioned in the late 11th-century Domesday Book where it is referred to – like most villages in northern Yorkshire – as vastatus i.e. deliberately wrecked by the invading Normans to prevent uprisings against them.
A hermitage or small monastic settlement may have existed at Nun Monkton during the Anglian period in Northumbria, prior to the arrival of the Vikings, giving rise to the 'Monkton' part of the village's name. The arrival of the nuns came about a century after the Norman Conquest.In 1172 an Anglo-Norman landowner, Ivetta of the Arches, endowed a small Benedictine nunnery which owned the village and stood on the important ford route from York and Moor Monkton to the south and Beningbrough and Shipton to the north, coming across the river. These routes ended when the ferry was discontinued in the middle of the 20th century. The Priory existed until 1536 when it was dissolved by Henry VIII, despite a plea from his second wife, Anne Boleyn, that it be spared. Records suggest that some of the nuns, returned to their families with small pensions of £4 a year and still under monastic vows of celibacy, endured considerable hardship as a result of the closure of the convent.
...
Wikipedia