Aylestone nr. Leicester / Aileston / Ailestone

There are four entries for Aylestone [variant spelling] in the Domesday survey [http://opendomesday.org/place/SK5700/aylestone/] [accessed 2 September 2015], none of which mentions cleric or church in it. The Victoria County History (Leicester, vol. 4, 1958) notes: "There is no record of a church at Aylestone until the beginning of the 13th century, but nothing suggests that it was a recent foundation in 1219 [...] The tower is all that survives of the 13th-century church [...] The font stands in the south aisle; it dates from the 13th century, and has a plain circular bowl, supported on a circular stem, with four semi-detached shafts, all with moulded capitals." The Aylestone Parish site [www.aylestone-parish.org.uk/tour/infex.html] [accessed 20 September 2006] notes: "The font has an undecorated circular bowl dating from the thirteenth century. The elaborately carved cover is Victorian in style". This same source notes that a major restoration of the building was began in 1894, at which time "the north door was blocked up and the font moved to just inside the south door" [source: [NB: not noted where the original location of the font was]. The roughly hemispherical basin is of the type that has the capitals of the columns of the base integrated in the underbowl; it is likely that the shafts are a Victorian replacement of the originals; the quadrangular lower base appears original. Not mentioned in Pevsner (1984)