From earliest times Rennington Parish has been an agricultural area – its name derived from the Anglo-Saxon – the farm of Regna’s people. And until recent years the entire population was employed on the farms.
The Manor of Rock, of which the boundaries have not changed since the early 12th Century, formed a small part of the Barony of Alnwick. In the late 13th Century it was held by William de Rok who paid to his overlord each year a modest sum known as half a knight’s fee.
In 1267 a survey of Rennington recorded several freeholds: Philip De Broxfield held 40 acres, Everard Freeman held 24 acres, Hugh De Broxfield held 120 acres and Richard De Broxfield held 48 acres. Rennington and Broxfield were owned separately until shortly after 1414 when the land was transferred to the Percy family and being part of the Barony of Alnwick held by the Duke of Northumberland.
Rock Hall developed through the early modern period, originating as a 14th Century pele tower and being added to with a manor house around 1600 by the Lawson family. The pele tower was one of scores on both sides of the border with Scotland where life was made dangerous and all forms of possessions vulnerable by raiding parties, guerilla warfare, and the occasional depredations of larger armies. Rock and Rennington both suffered by raids from Scots and some of these depredations were recorded in 1574 and 1576. In the middle of the 16th century a small band of Spanish mercenaries under the command of Sir Julian Romero were quartered at Rock to try and keep some semblance of peace.
The Rock Estate subsequently passed to the Bosanquet family in 1804 as a dowry to Charles Bosanquet, a merchant in the City of London from his wife, Charlotte Holford, daughter of the then landowner. He completed the division of the Estate into farms, restored the church which was in a ruinous state, rebuilt the village and restored the Hall which had been badly damaged from a fire in 1752.
Rennington village itself was formerly a township and chapelry in the larger parish of Embleton. In 1866 Rennington became a separate civil parish and on 1 April 1955 the parishes of Broxfield, Rock and Stamford were abolished and merged with Rennington.
From 1974 to 2009 Rennington parish was in Alnwick District until the new Northumberland County Council was formed as a unitary authority.
