Kingston nr. Cambridge / Chingestone

There are seven entries for this Kingston [variant spelling] in the Domesday survey [http://opendomesday.org/place/TL3455/kingston/] [accessed 16 May 2016], none of which mentions cleric or church in it. The Lysons (1806-1833) write: "The font at Kingston is in the style of the early Gothic; it is octagonal, standing on eight short pillars, over which are trefoil arches enriched with crockets". Noted in Paley's Guide (1844): "The font is Decorated, and perhaps one of the best of this period in Cambridgeshire. It is octagonal, and stands on low shafts supporting trefoiled arches with crocketed canopies. There is probably a central stem, but the inside of the arches is stuffed with mortar." Cox & Harvey (1907) include the noteworthy baptismal font at Kingston among the best Decorated fonts in the county. Noted in Kelly's Directory of the county for 1929: "a Decorated font with octagonal basin, supported on low shafts with trefoiled arches under crocketed canopies". Noted and illustrated in the RCHM (Cambridgeshire, 1968), which reports the stem as a later addition. Pevsner (1970) writes: "Font. Could not the octagonal stem with its shafts and crocketed cusped gables be the bowl of an early C14 font?". The Victoria County History (Cambridge..., vol. 5, 1973) notes: "Kingston probably had a church before 1092, for Picot the sheriff granted two-thirds of the tithes of his knights in Kingston to the canons of St. Giles, Cambridge, later Barnwell Priory. [...] Nothing remains visible of an 11th-century church, and the earliest surviving fabric suggests an extensive rebuilding in the 13th century"; no font mentioned in the VCH entry. Described and illustrated in Cambridgeshire Churches (2005): "a survival from the Decorated church, and unusual for that period [...]". [NB: another 13th-century font of related design is found at Standon, in Hertfordshire [it should be pointed out here that these two counties are contiguous], and Gatton, in Surrey, is an example of a similar13th-century plain octagonal basin on a more complex base. Basins of this type with little or no decoration are also carved in the 14th century, with examples at Lapworth and Wootton Wawen, both in Warwickshire, for instance [both of these have underbowls decorated with human heads, though]]. The basin has been broken at some point in the past and the pieces cemented together].