Royston on the Greenwich Meridian / Crux Roaesie / Crux Roesea / Crux Roys / Rhosiae / Roais / Roeis / Roesia / Roheise / Roihes / Roiston

No entry for this Royston found in the Domesday survey. The Victoria County History (Hertfoed, vol. 3, 1912) notes: "The canons at Royston built a chapel with a burial-place attached possibly between 1164 and 1179. [...] The lack of a separate parish church for so considerable a town was thus 'little prejudicial' to the inhabitants while the priory existed. Soon after its dissolution they bought the priory church 'to their great charges. [...] The nave, which consists of the chancel and quire of the old church, was built c. 1250 [...] The old font has recently been placed in the churchyard, after being for many years in private hands; it has a plain octagonal bowl of the 13th century and a 15th-century stem with a plain arched recess in each face." The entry for this church in English Heritage [Listing NGR: TL3043944663] (1967) informs: "Modern font copied from original now in Royston Church; early C17 font cover, octagonal ogee with acorn finial." The Victoria County History (Cambridge..., vol. 8, 1982) notes: "The parish church, recorded by 1217 [...] From an older church, whose steep roof line is visible inside on the tower's east wall, there survive fragments of Romanesque carving. [...] The font is a modern copy of the medieval one, now in Royston church, found in a farmyard in Wendy in use as a horse trough." The present font is obviously a composite object, made of three unmatched parts from different periods; a plain octagonal basin of plain tapering sides, a pedestal base of much later date decorated with pointed windows with blank shields inserted in them, and an octagonal lower base that matches neither of the two pieces above. No font cover present. [NB: the font now at this church bears no resemblance to the modern one at Abington Pigotts, claimed to be a copy of it [cf. supra] -- is there a second font here? If not, where does the claim originate from?].