Kirby-Bellars (St. Peter)
KIRBY-BELLARS (St. Peter), a parish, in the union of Melton-Mowbray, hundred of Framland, N. division of the county of Leicester, 3½ miles (W. by S.) from Melton-Mowbray; containing 236 inhabitants. It takes the adjunct to its name from the foundation of a college here in the reign of Edward II. by Roger Beller, for a warden and twelve priests; this college, in 1359, was made conventual, for a prior and Canons regular of the order of St. Augustine, and at the Dissolution the revenue was estimated at £178. 7. 10. The parish comprises 2600 acres; it is situated on the road from Melton to Leicester, and on the navigable river Wreak. Here, also, is a station of the Syston and Peterborough railway. The living is a perpetual curacy; net income, £84; patron and impropriator, Sir Robert Burdett, Bart.: the tithes have been commuted for land. The church is a neat plain edifice of stone, with a tower surmounted by a lofty spire. In 1821, many teeth and bones of the elephant and other animals, together with the horns of the antelope, and also an urn containing black beads, were dug up.
Transcribed from A Topographical Dictionary of England, by Samuel Lewis, seventh edition, published 1858.