A donation of £1.2 million has been given for theological research at Cambridge University.

The funds, given by the Kirby Laing educational and cultural foundation, will be used to expand post-graduate study of the New Testament according the Catholic paper The Tablet.

Msgr Mark Langham, head of the Cambridge University Chaplaincy said that "New Testament studies at Cambridge have a history which stretches back to St John Fisher, the first Lady Margaret Professor of Theology.

"This welcome and generous donation will ensure that theological research continues at Cambridge at the highest level, and in particular will enable many Commonwealth and foreign students, who have historically been unable to take up places because of the difficulty of financing their studies, to come to study here."

The foundation have previously donated in able to secure the future of the Lady Margaret Professorship in Divinity, the oldest chair at the university, founded by Lady Margaret Beaufort, mother of King Henry VII, in 1502.