CAISTOR, or CASTOR, a market-town and parish
partly in the northern division of the wapentake of
WALSHCROFT, but chiefly in the southern division of
the wapentake of YARBOROUGH, parts of LINDSEY,
county of LINCOLN, 23 miles (N.N.E.) from Lincoln,
and" 153 (N.)' from London, containing, with the chapelry
of Holton le Moor, 1388 inhabitants. This was
evidently a station of the Romans; numerous coins and
other Roman relics have been discovered. According
to tradition, Hengist, after having repulsed the Picts
and Scots, obtained from Vortigern the grant of so much
land as he could encompass with the hide of an ox:
having divided the hide into small thongs, he was
enabled to enclose a considerable area, forming the site
of the town, which, from that circumstance, was by
the' Saxons called Thuang Ceastre, or Thong Ceastre.
But Dr. Stukeley derives the prefix from the Saxon
thegn, a thane, or nobleman. The marriage of Rowena,
daughter of Hengist, to Vortigern, was solemnized here
in 453. Egbert, who finally brought the several kingdoms
of the Octarchy under his dominion, obtained a
signal victory at this place over Wiglof, King of Mercia,
in 827, in commemoration of which a cross was erected'
on the castle hill, where many bodies have been dug up,
and a stone.with a mutilated inscription, apparently
recording the dedication of the spoils by the victor to
some sacred purpose. The town is well supplied with
water from four springs issuing out of a grey stone
rock, three of which unite their streams on the
western side of the town, and fall into the river
Ancholme j the other flows into the same river, near
the junction of the Kelsey canal with that to Glandford-
Bridge. The market is on Saturday; the fairs
are on the Saturdays before Palm-Sunday, Whit-
Sunday, and Old Michaelmas-day. The town is within
the jurisdiction of the county magistrates, who hold a
petty session here. The living is a discharged vicarage,
with the perpetual curacy of Clixby annexed, rated in
the king's books at £7. 6. 8., endowed with £200 royal
bounty, and in the peculiar jurisdiction and patronage
of the Prebendary of Caistor in the Cathedral Church
of Lincoln. The church, dedicated to St. Peter and St.
Paul, is a spacious structure in the early English style,
with some remains of Norman architecture; it has a
fine tower, with a chapel on the south side, now used
as a vestry-room: it stands within the area of the-an-
Qient castle, with, the materials of which it was partly
built. A singular,; ceremony is observed here, on the
performance of which" depends the tenure of an estate -.
the holder sends- aft agent on Palm-Sunday, who cracks
a whip three times in the north porch, while the minister
is reading the first lesson; after which, folding the
thong round the handle, and at the same time tying up
some-twigs of mountain-ash with it, he attaches a small
purse, with some silver coin in it, to the end, enters the
church, and bowing to the minister, takes his seat in
front of the reading-desk; on the commencement of the
second lesson, he kneels down in front of the minister,
and flourishing the whip three times, keeps the purse
suspended over his head till the conclusion of it, when
he retires into the chancel: after the service is ended,
he takes the whip and the purse to the manor-house at
Hundon, where they are deposited. There are places of
worship for Independents and Methodists. The free
grammar school was founded, in 1630, by the Rev. Francis
Rawlinson, rector of St. Nicholas', South Kelsey, who
endowed it with £400, which sum was laid out in the
purchase of a portion of the great tithes of Beesby,
now producing £ 130 per annum; the endowment has
been augmented with £60 per annum, arising from lands
purchased with a donation by William Hansard, Esq.:
the school has an exhibition of £10 per annum to
Jesus' College, Cambridge, and is open to all sons of
parishioners, who are instructed in the Greek, Latin,
and English languages, and in writing and arithmetic,
by a master and an usher.