There are few actual relics of this period in the way of archæological finds, so that the discovery of a tiny key of lead, with trefles on the ring, cast in a double mould, at Tent Cottage, where it was found under a stone, is worth remark. Mr. H. S. Cowper thought it a pilgrim's badge of the fourteenth or fifteenth century, and the site was one of the "grounds" of the abbey "tenants."
The list of "tenants" referred to is in an agreement of 1532 to prevent "improvement." They had "inclosed common pasture more largelie than they ought to doe, under the colour of one bargaine called Bounding of the pasture," and this sort of "improvement" was thenceforth forbidden. But five years later the abbey was dissolved, to the great harm and regret of the country side. Though a bad abbot did, for a time, give trouble by making deer parks, the abbey rule, on the whole, was good. Monk Coniston made slow but sure progress, and reached a point beyond which it did not advance for the next three hundred years.
What it was like when the abbey gave it up may be gathered from the report of Henry VIII.'s commissioners:--"There is moche wood growing in Furneysfelles in the mounteynes there, as Byrk, Holey, Asshe, Ellers, Lyng, lytell short Okes, and other Undrewood, but no Tymber of any valewe;" they mention also "Hasells." That there _had_ been timber is proved by the massive oak beams of many a farmhouse and old hall, but the forests were all by this time cleared, and coppice had taken their place. "There is another yerely profytte comming and growing of the said woods, called Grenehewe, Bastyng, Bleching, bynding, making of Sadeltrees, Cartwheles, cuppes, disshes, and many other thynges wrought by Cowpers and Turners" (the beginning of well-known local industries) "with making of Coles (charcoal) and pannage of Hoggs."
After the dissolution the manor remained in the Crown until 1662, when Charles II. granted it to General Monk, Duke of Albemarle, whose descendant Elizabeth, daughter of George, Duke of Montague (whence the other name of Peel Island), married Henry, third Duke of Buccleugh, whose representative is now lord of the manor.
Monk Coniston remained separate from Church Coniston, both ecclesiastically and politically, until the Local Government Act of 1894 establishing Parish Councils gave occasion for the union of the two shores of the lake into one civil parish. But Monk Coniston is still in the ecclesiastical parish of Hawkshead.