The parish boundaries include two important landed estates: Newnham Paddox, seat of the family of the Earls of Denbigh since the 15th century and Newbold Revel, home of the medieval writer Sir Thomas Malory.

Monks Kirby is today a small, attractive, wealthy commuter village with many residents working in Coventry, Birmingham, Leicester and London.

Monks Kirby is dominated by the church of St Edith, a site of Christian worship since at least the 10th century and which functioned as a Priory in the Middle Ages.

[12] [nb 3] At the time of the Norman Conquest, the neighbouring estate of Newnham Paddox was owned by Leofwin, nephew of Leofric, Earl of Mercia (husband of Lady Godiva).

[13] After the Conquest, the land around Monks Kirby came into the ownership of Geoffrey de la Guerche, a Breton knight who married Aelgifu, Leofwin's daughter.

[4] Geoffrey endowed the rebuilt church with lands (notably the village of Copston Magna), and gave it as a priory to the Benedictine Abbey of St Nicolas in Anjou in France.

[4] After Geoffrey's death, his estates, including the lands around Monks Kirby reverted to the King, who subsequently granted them to Nigel d'Aubigny, the father of Roger de Mowbray whose descendants were to become Earls of Nottingham and Dukes of Norfolk.

The name of one of the village streets, Bond End, reflects the boundary between the feudal tenant farmers ("bondsmen") and the properties of the traders and craftsmen who operated around the Priory Church.

[17] Through the fourteenth and early fifteenth century the Hundred Years War with France caused major problems for French-led priories like Monks Kirby.

He granted the rectory and the patronage of Monks Kirby vicarage and the income from the collection of local tithes to his foundation of Trinity College, Cambridge.

The large and valuable manor of Monks Kirby[nb 5] was rapidly claimed by the powerful Charles Brandon, 1st Duke of Suffolk.

[nb 7] Meanwhile, the Manor of Monks Kirby had passed to descendants of Charles Brandon until it was bought by George Villiers' mother Mary, Countess of Buckingham who bequeathed it to her grandson Basil Feilding, the second Earl of Denbigh on her death in 1632.

[24] The most notorious incident in the Monks Kirby enclosure process happened in 1837 when the 7th Earl of Denbigh wanted to rent a large parcel of land, Pailton Pastures, from the other major landowner, Trinity College, Cambridge.

Nonconformity in the Parish dated back to the time of Oliver Cromwell and a Baptist congregation was established in 1817, its members initially suffering much persecution.

The tenant farmers formed the dominant rural middle class in Monks Kirby society from the Victorian era to the mid twentieth century.

The Monks Kirby Farmers Club Show was the major event of their year with hundreds of cows and horses exhibited and, at its peak in 1914, 7,000 people attending.

[nb 10] [25] Trinity College retains the benefice today (and therefore is still involved in appointing the vicar)[27] but divested itself of substantial landholdings around Monks Kirby following the Second World War.

[28] The historic parish boundaries of Monks Kirby, existing from the medieval era through to the nineteenth century included several neighbouring villages and hamlets: Copston Magna, Pailton, Stretton-under-Fosse, Newbold Revel, Brockhurst, Little Walton, Street Ashton and Easenhall.

[29] The (civil and ecclesiastical) boundaries of Monks Kirby still include the lands of the village of Cestersover, abandoned in the Middle Ages.

Since the 1950s the primarily agricultural population of the village has been replaced by a wealthy, well educated older demographic through a process of extended suburbanisation from the many nearby towns and cities.

During the Second World War, The 10th Earl of Denbigh handed over Newnham Paddox House to another community of nuns: Cannonesses of the Holy Sepulchre.

The remaining, elderly sisters have now dispersed and Street Ashton House sold, bringing to an end a 150-year tradition of (renewed) monastic life in Monks Kirby.

St Joseph's continues to be a worshipping community today, with a large congregation gathering on Sundays from the parish which spreads beyond the small village of Monks Kirby.

The Chapel of the Sacred Heart at the burial ground was designed by the architect Thomas Henry Wyatt as part of the remodelling of Newnham Paddox House, undertaken for the eighth earl in 1888.

[42] The grand gates, stables and Brown's landscaped gardens remain and the current Earl still lives in a twentieth century, wooden house in the grounds.