Colchester No. 9 / Colecastro / Colecestra

There are seventeen entries for Colchester [variant spellings] in the Domesday survey [http://opendomesday.org/place/TL9925/colchester/] [accessed 8 June 2018]; a priest is mentioned as lord three times (two in 1066, one in 1086) and "0.5 church lands" is noted in one of the entries, but none of them mentions a church, though there must have some there at the time. The entry for this borough in the Victoria County History (Essex, vol. 9, 1994) notes: "The church, on the east side of North Hill near its junction with High Street, was established before the Conquest when it was held of the king's alms by two priests [...] In 1066 St. Peter's was the richest church recorded in the county"; no font is mentioned in the VCH entry for this church. The Parish website [http://www.stpeterscol.org.uk/] [accessed 21 June 2010] informs: "The font at the west end of the north aisle is in the heavy neo-Gothic style, the work of C F Hayward, 1859. It bears the inscription "suffer little children to come unto me for such is the kingdom of heaven" from the words of Jesus recorded in the Gospel of Matthew, chapter 19 verse 14. There is no record concerning the fate of what ancient font may have served the church in earlier times. The present font is still in use today". Bettley & Pevsner (2007) note: "Heavy Neo-Gothic font, 1859 by Hayward, executed by Earp."