Dunstable Kingsbury (The Gatehouse Record)

In the civil parish of Dunstable.
In the historic county of Bedfordshire.
Modern Authority of Bedfordshire.
1974 county of Bedfordshire.
Medieval County of Bedfordshire.

OS Map Grid Reference: TL019217
Latitude 51.88707° Longitude -0.51774°

Dunstable Kingsbury has been described as a probable Palace.

There are no visible remains.

Description

The site of a house or palace belonging to the King. Documents refer to Henry I having built the house and spending Christmas there in 1123 and 1132. The lands attached to the house were granted by Henry to the Augustinian Priory of Dunstable when he founded it in 1131/2, but the Charter specifies that he retained the house and garden. King John gave the house to the Priory in 1204. By the time of the Dissolution, the house had become a farmhouse and is later referred to by the name Kingsbury. The house was restored in the early 20th century, and its barn converted for use as the town museum. In 1934 it was sold and divided up into the Old Palace Lodge (which became a hotel in 1960), Kingsbury Stables (which became the Norman King public house in 1961) and Kingsbury Court.
There are now no visible remains of the palace. (Bedfordshire HER)

Sources of information, references and further reading

County Historic Environment Record (or Sites and Monuments Record) number(s) 148; 4353; 4355; 14965.

Books
- Colvin, H.M., Brown, R.Allen and Taylor, A.J., 1963, The history of the King's Works Vol. 2: the Middle Ages (London: HMSO) p. 924-5
  Page, Wm (ed), 1912, 'Parishes: Dunstable' VCH Bedfordshire Vol. 3 p. 351 online transcription
Periodical Articles
- Curran, Joan, 1977, 'The Old Palace Lodge' Dunstable & District Local History Society Newsletter online copy
  1967-9, Bedfordshire magazine Vol. 11 p. 212-16, 237-43, 306-13, 353-58
  1816, The Gentleman's Magazine Vol. 86 Part 2 p. 393 online copy
Antiquarian (Histories and accounts from late medieval and early modern writers)
- Camden, Wm, 1607, Britannia hypertext critical edition by Dana F. Sutton (2004)
Other sources: Theses; 'grey' literature; in-house reports; unpublished works; etc.
- Albion Archaeology, 2003 (edited January 2005), Extensive Urban Survey - Bedfordshire and Luton (Bedfordshire County Council and English Heritage) Download copy

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The information on this web page may be derived from information compiled by and/or copyright of Historic England, County Historic Environment Records and other individuals and organisations. It may also contain information licensed under the Open Government Licence. All the sources given should be consulted to identify the original copyright holder and permission obtained from them before use of the information on this site for commercial purposes.
The author and compiler of Gatehouse does not receive any income from the site and funds it himself. The information within this site is provided freely for educational purposes only.

The bibliography owes much to various bibliographies produced by John Kenyon for the Council for British Archaeology, the Castle Studies Group and others.

Suggestions for finding online and/or hard copies of bibliographical sources can be seen at this link.
Minor archaeological investigations, such as watching brief reports, and some other 'grey' literature is most likely to be held by H.E.R.s but is often poorly referenced and is unlikely to be recorded here, or elsewhere, but some suggestions can be found here.

The possible site or monument is represented on maps as a point location. This is a guide only. It should be noted that OS grid references defines an area, not a point location. In practice this means the actual center of the site or monument may often, but not always, be to the North East of the point shown. Locations derived from OS grid references and from latitude longitiude may differ by a small distance.
Further information on mapping and location can be seen at this link.

Please help to make this as useful a resource as possible by contacting Gatehouse if you see errors, can add information or have suggestions for improvements in functality and design.
Help is acknowledged.

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