Riby is a village about four miles SW of Grimsby. The church is a limestone and ironstone rubble cruciform building consisting of a chancel, a nave with a S and N aisle, and a crossing tower added in the 15thc. The church was restored by Benjamin Ferrey in 1868. The Romanesque features of this site are the blocked N doorway and the fragment of a font.

The Domesday Survey records that in 1066 'Ribi' was held by Earl Harold and Stenkil of Riby; in 1086 it passed under the lordship of William, son of Nigel; Ascelin; Erneis of Buron; Ralph and Ernwin the Priest; Earl Hugh of Chester and Roger of Poitou were tenants-in-chief. The manor valued £1.5. The first record of the church dates to the first decades of the 12thc, when Geoffrey Trussebut granted it to Grimsby Abbey, and this donation was also confirmed in 1155-8 by King Henry II.

Although Nikolaus Pevsner does not mention the font fragment, it is recorded by Arthur Mee, who notes that it is the 'ancient font' of the church.