Fordon was a chapel of ease to Hunmanby in the 12th century; with which it was granted to Bardney Abbey by Walter de Gant in 1115.
The font has a 13th century base (Pevsner and Neave 1995, 424), suggesting that, as a dependent chapel, it might not have had right of baptism in the previous century when most of the cylindrical fonts were being supplied to the Riding.