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Colton History - Home
> The People & Memories of Colton COLTON MAPS •
Colton-recent aerial
> General history of Colton and surrounding areas The name Colton was first noted in the Domesday book in 1085. Where the name 'Colton' derived from is not clear, although there are two possible explanations. The area was more than likely to be a Saxon settlement, named Colton because of the abundance of coal in the area. Another possibility is that the land in this area was owned by a farmer called 'Cola'. An enclosure or farmstead in old English would be known as a - 'tun' or 'ton', hence the name Colton. The Colton countryside has changed little for last 150 years since the Marchioness of Hertford enclosed large areas of land for the Temple Newsam Estate and the field system you see today was set up. This did away with the field names used for centuries by the villagers and now almost entirely forgotten: Colton Common, North Field (near Selby Road), Leys (behind Colton Methodist Chapel), Kirk Field(across & mainly South of Colton Road) and the Bitch Daughter Field south of the school.* Evidence for settlement at Colton stretches back over two thousand years. In the Domesday Book of 1085 Colton (DB Latin-Coletun) is described as being 'waste', but it is also listed as having a church, meaning that the area must have been important at one time. This church would have been on the site of the present day St Mary's at Whitkirk. By the early 12th century the area was acquired by the Knights Templars, as part of their Temple Newsam estate and it would have been re-populated after that time with farm labourers and their families. The markings of the original village can be found in the grounds of Temple Newsam house and to the east of the present-day village. A gap in the houses on the western side of the village marks the site of a medieval tenement site and in other areas of the old village site, excavations in 1980s uncovered pottery dated to the 12th and 13th centuries. There are also well defined areas of ridge and furrow medieval farming systems, bearing out evidence of the agricultural activity that financed the Crusader knights located nearby. After the disbanding of the Templars at the beginning of the 14th century, Colton was taken over by Lord Darcy who moved the villagers out in order to create a park for his new house at Temple Newsam. Darcy was to achieve fame (or infamy!) as the leader of the Catholic uprising against Henry VIII, known as the Pilgrimage of Grace. He was subsequently executed for his part in the rebellion and his house and estates taken over by the Crown once again. So, although it was later eclipsed by the Temple Newsam House and estate, it is worth noting that it was Colton that was originally the area of prominence, and it was the people of that village who were responsible for putting food on the table, both at the House, and to many a knight in the Holy Land. By David Owens
Do you have any further information on the general history of Colton? Email:history@mycolton.com To see & read more about Colton's history click on the sections below.
> The People & Memories of Colton
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