Malmesbury Abbey
| Malmesbury Abbey | |
|
Malmesbury, Wiltshire | |
|---|---|
| Status: | Parish church |
 Malmesbury Abbey | |
| Church of England | |
| Diocese of Bristol | |
| Location | |
| Location: | 51°35’5"N, 2°5’54"W |
| History | |
| Information | |
| Website: | www.malmesburyabbey.com |
Malmesbury Abbey is the grand parish church in Malmesbury in Wiltshire.
The church is all that remains of a mediæval abbey which once stood in and dominated the town, hence the church's name. The abbey was one of the few monasteries in England with a continual history from the 7th century through to the Dissolution of the Monasteries.[1]
The church is a far grander edifice than one might expect as a church for a town of this size, which is testament to the wealth of the Abbey and of the town. Its structure is essentially Norman Romanesque, but his has been embedded in soaring Gothic. There is older structure within though; one doorway in the west of the church is Anglo-Saxon, a reminder of its early foundation.
History
In the later seventh century, the site of the Abbey was chosen by Maidulbh, an Irish monk who established a hermitage, teaching local children. Toward the end of his life (late seventh century), the area was conquered by the Saxons.[2]
Malmesbury Abbey as such was founded as a Benedictine monastery around 676 by the scholar-poet Aldhelm, a nephew of King Ine of Wessex. The town of Malmesbury grew round the expanding Abbey and under Alfred the Great was made burh,[3] with an assessment of 12 hides.
This was one of King Athelstan's favourite foundations, and in his lifetime he lavished it with gives. In 941, Athelstan was buried in the Abbey. King Athelstan had died in Gloucester in October 939. The choice of Malmesbury over the New Minster in Winchester indicated that the king remained an outsider to the West Saxon court.[4] A mint was founded at the Abbey around this time.[5]
By the 11th century Malmesbury contained the second largest library in Europe and was considered one of the leading European seats of learning. The Abbey was the site of an early attempt at human flight when, during the early 11th century, the monk Eilmer of Malmesbury attached wings to his body and flew from a tower. Eilmer flew over 200 yards before landing, breaking both legs. He later remarked that the only reason he did not fly further was the lack of a tail on his glider. The 12th-century historian William of Malmesbury was a member of the community, and it is mentioned in the Domesday Book [6]
The Domesday Survey says of the Abbey:
- In Wiltshire: Highway (11 hides), Dauntsey (10 hides), Somerford Keynes (5 hides), Brinkworth (5 hides), Norton, near Malmesbury (5 hides), Brokenborough with Corston (50 hides), Kemble (30 hides—now in Glos.), Long Newnton (30 hides), Charlton (20 hides), Garsdon (3 hides), Crudwell (40 hides), Bremhill (38 hides), Purton (35 hides); (fn. 127) in Gloucestershire: Littleton - upon - Severn (5 hides); (fn. 128) and in Warwickshire: Newbold Pacey (3 hides).[7][8][9]
These lands were valued at 188 pounds 14 shillings in all and were assessed as 3 knights' fees.
The current Abbey was substantially completed by 1180. The 431-foot tall spire, and the tower it was built upon, collapsed in a storm around 1500 destroying much of the church, including two thirds of the nave and the transept. The west tower fell around 1550, demolishing the three westernmost bays of the nave. As a result of these two collapses, less than half of the original building stands today.
At the time of the dissolution of the monasteries, Malmesbury Abbey owned 23,000 acres in the twenty parishes that constituted Malmesbury Hundred. It was closed at the Dissolution in 1539 by the commissioners of King Henry VIII and was sold, with all its lands, to William Stumpe, a rich merchant. He returned the abbey church to the town for continuing use as a parish church, and filled the abbey buildings with twenty looms for his cloth-weaving enterprise.[10]
During the Civil War, Malmesbury is said to have changed hands as many as seven times, and the abbey was fiercely fought over. Hundreds of pock-marks left by bullets and shot can still be seen on the south, west and east sides of Malmesbury Abbey walls.
The church today
Today much of the Abbey survives, with the ruined parts still joined onto the complete structure. The existing third of the nave remains in use as an active place of worship.
Malmesbury Abbey is in full use as the parish church of Malmesbury, in the Diocese of Bristol. The remains still contain a fine parvise which holds some examples of books from the Abbey library. The Anglo-Saxon charters of Malmesbury, though extended by forgeries and improvements executed in the abbey's scriptorium, provide source material today for the history of Wessex and the West Saxon church from the seventh century.
Pictures
Outside links
 |
("Wikimedia Commons" has material about Malmesbury Abbey) |
- Malmesbury Abbey
- Malmesbury Abbey at Window on Wiltshire's Heritage.
- Image directory of Malmesbury Abbey at ArtServe.
- Malmesbury Abbey at The Normans: A European People.
References
- ↑ Kelly, Susan (2005). Charters of Malmesbury Abbey. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press. p. 1. ISBN 978-0-19-726317-4.
- ↑ Blackwell Encyclopedia of Anglo Saxon England, page 209.
- ↑ Blackwell Encyclopedia of Anglo Saxon England, page 209.
- ↑ Sarah Foot, ‘Æthelstan (893/4–939)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004; online edn, Sept 2011
- ↑ Blackwell Encyclopedia of Anglo Saxon England, page 209.
- ↑ Barbara Yourke, Wessex Passio.
- ↑ V.C.H. Wilts. ii, pp. 125-7.
- ↑ Dom. Bk. (Rec. Com.), i, 165.
- ↑ {{brithist|36532 'House of Benedictine monks: Abbey of Malmesbury', A History of the County of Wiltshire: Volume 3 (1956), pp. 210-231.] Date accessed: 30 April 2014.
- ↑ D. A. Crowley, ed. Victoria History of Wiltshire XIV: Malmesbury Hundred, (Oxford) 1991.
- Smith, M Q: The Sculptures of the South Porch of Malmesbury Abbey: A Short Guide, 1975
