page_title: Kenilworth
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Kenilworth / History
caption_attribution_description: English: Parish church of St Nicholas, Kenilworth, Warwickshire, seen from the southwest
context_page_description: Kenilworth is a market town and civil parish in Warwickshire, England, about 6 miles south-west of central Coventry, 5 miles north of Warwick and 90 miles north-west of London. It lies on Finham Brook, a tributary of the River Sowe, which joins the River Avon about 2 miles north-east of the town centre. The 2011 Census recorded a parish population of 22,413. The town is noted architecturally for the extensive ruins of Kenilworth Castle, the ruins of Kenilworth Abbey in Abbey Fields park, St Nicholas's Parish Church, and the town's clock tower.
context_section_description: A settlement existed at Kenilworth by the time of the 1086 Domesday Book, which records it as Chinewrde, meaning "farm of a woman named Cynehild".
  Geoffrey de Clinton (died 1134) initiated the building of an Augustinian priory in 1122, which coincided with his initiation of Kenilworth Castle. The priory was raised to the rank of an abbey in 1450 and suppressed with the Dissolution of the Monasteries in the 1530s. Thereafter, the abbey grounds next to the castle were made common land in exchange for what Robert Dudley, 1st Earl of Leicester used to enlarge the castle. Only a few walls and a storage barn of the original abbey survive.
  Just off Coventry Road in Kenilworth is a field called Parliament Piece. This may be where Henry III held a Parliament in August 1266, while his troops besieged Kenilworth Castle, where the late Simon de Montfort's followers, led by Henry de Hastings, were still holding out against the king's forces. This Parliament led to the Dictum of Kenilworth: a settlement that offered the rebels a way of recovering the lands that the Crown had seized from them. One copy of the Dictum is endorsed in castris apud Kenilworth — "in the camp (or castle) at Kenilworth". Members of the public have free access to Parliament Piece, which is owned by the Open Spaces Society and leased to Warwick District Council.
  Geoffrey de Clinton had a deer park created near Kenilworth. In 1488 Ralph, abbot of Kenilworth Abbey had 40 acres (16 ha) of land near Redfern, north-west of the town, emparked as Duck Park, which despite its name was a deer park. By about 1540 there were eight deer parks near Kenilworth. Another near Rudfen was a 30-acre (12 ha) park that was called Little Park in 1581. It was owned by Robert Briscoe in 1649 and was still called Briscoe's Park in 1785. One of the eight deer parks, The Chase, can still be traced. The eastern part of its park pale is about 1 mile (1.6 km) west of the castle, while the northern part forms the boundary between Chase Wood and the farm road and bridleway between Little Chase Farm and Warrior's Lodge Farm.
  In about 1414 Henry V had le plesans en marais — "The Pleasaunce in the Marsh" — built about 0.5 miles (800 m) west of the castle. This was a timber-framed banqueting house surrounded by a moated earthwork about 600 feet (180 m) by 500 feet (150 m), which 15th-century kings used instead of the Castle's state apartments. In the 16th century, Henry VIII had the banqueting house demolished and the materials reused for timber-framed buildings inside the castle. The mere was drained in 1649, but "The Pleasaunce" earthworks survive as a Scheduled Monument.
  Elizabeth I visited Robert Dudley, 1st Earl of Leicester at Kenilworth Castle several times, the last in 1575. Dudley entertained the Queen with pageants and banquets costing some £1,000 per day that surpassed anything seen in England before. These included fireworks.
  Warwick District Council owns and manages land across the Coventry Road at Tainter's Hill. This public open space was designated "for the poor of the parish" under an inclosure act in 1756 and is registered as common land. In 1778 Kenilworth windmill was built. Later turned into the town's water tower, it is now a private home, shorn of its sails.
  In 1844 the London and Birmingham Railway opened the Coventry to Leamington Line, including Kenilworth railway station. The L&NWR had a new station built in 1883 and a new link line between Kenilworth and Berkswell in 1884 to bypass Coventry. This closed to all traffic on 3 March 1969. British Rail withdrew passenger services from the Coventry to Leamington Line and closed Kenilworth Station in January 1965 in line with The Reshaping of British Railways report. In May 1977, British Rail reinstated passenger services, but did not reopen Kenilworth station, which became derelict and was eventually demolished. In 2011 Warwick Council granted John Laing plc planning permission to build a new station, which was to open in 2013. However, this was postponed by four years to December 2017. In 2018, a track from Coventry was open
caption: The parish church of St Nicholas, where Elizabeth I worshipped in 1575 and James I visited in 1616
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