URPoint Details
Isley Walton is a tiny hamlet consisting of only a few farms and cottages near the main road between Castle Donington and Breedon-on-the-Hill.
An agricultural area with strong red loam soil and pleasant undulating country.
The village church, which was wholly rebuilt in 1819, has a small north tower, nave and chancel under a single roof and a Georgian baluster-shaped font with a stone lid.
About a mile south-east is Langley, not a village but open countryside surrounding Langley Priory, which stands in beautiful, lake-watered grounds fed by a stream which flows on down through Diseworth and Long Whatton to the Soar.
The Priory is a fine old mansion on the site of a Benedictine Nunnery founded at the beginning of the 12th century. The centre, with its pediment, is 18th century, but the projected wings with their mullioned windows are 200 years older and one of them includes medieval masonry.
William Pantulf, the founder of the original Nunnery, is commemorated in one of the windows.
The property has been in the Shakespeare family since 1847 when John Shakespeare who became a noted scholar in oriental languages bought it.
- Type:
- Landmark