Lenton is an area of the City of Nottingham in the county of Nottinghamshire, England. It lies within the electoral ward of "Dunkirk and Lenton".
Lenton is a popular housing area for students at the University of Nottingham.
The name 'Lenton' is derived from the river Leen, which runs through the area.
History
Lenton originally grew up around a Cluniac priory, which was founded in 1105. As the fortunes of the priory grew (becoming one of the wealthiest monasteries in the country), so did the village of Lenton; by the time of the dissolution of the monasteries Lenton village was well enough established to continue without its priory.
From the closure of the priory to the late 1700s, Lenton was primarily a rural village, occupied mostly by those involved in agriculture. With the construction of the Nottingham Canal in the 1790s, however, a number of factories were built in the area and the population grew rapidly, increasing from 893 in 1801 to 3077 in 1831. The 'New Lenton' area was formed to accommodate the expansion of both residential and industrial needs on what had previously been farmland. Much of the industry of Lenton, as with the Nottingham area as a whole, was related to lace.
Lenton was originally a separate village, outside Nottingham's city boundaries; it became part of the city in 1877, when the boundaries were enlarged.
Lenton 900
In 2005 Lenton will be celebrating its nine-hundredth anniversary, a date which represents 900 years since the foundation of Lenton Priory. The centrepiece of the celebrations will be a special festival being held in Lenton Priory Church grounds in the summer.
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