Whitby Abbey
 Abbeys |
The gaunt 13 th century ruin of Whitby Abbey is situated dramatically on the high headland above sea and town. Though much of the building no longer stands, enough remains in situ , particularly the east façade, to indicate the vast scale of the original structure. The end wall of the north transept, the northern wall of the chancel and one section of the mighty east end have survived to almost full height. The south side, however, has fared less well, in fact, this part of the church has virtually disappeared. Gone too are the accompanying domestic buildings, the refectory where the monks ate, the dormitories where they slept and the cloisters around which these rooms were set.
The first abbey at Whitby was founded in AD657 by Abbess Hilda, later St Hilda, on land given by Oswy, King of Northumbria, in thanksgiving for victory against the pagan King Penda of Mercia. Renowned for the exemplary lives led by its Benedictine monks and nuns, the sacred site at Whitby became home to many of the early English saints, including Caedmon, the first English Christian poet; a cross commemorating him stands in the nearby St Mary's churchyard.
St Hilda's abbey was chosen for the honour of hosting the Great Synod of AD664. Here it was that King Oswy heard arguments from both sides of the divided church in England, Celtic and Roman. Finally, the authority and usages of the Roman Church was accepted, establishing, among other things, the method of determining the date of Easter. Excavations have revealed traces of lesser buildings on the site of the first Whitby abbey, dating to the 900's. As many of the artefacts uncovered are associated with weaving, they are considered to have been nun's cells.
A series of Danish invasions in 867, however, witnessed the complete destruction of the monastery together with its community. In 1078, the Norman conquerors of Britain refounded the Benedictine priory on the site of the older religious settlement; unfortunately, like its predecessor, nothing of the first Norman church has survived.
The abbey church that stands in ruins today was started in the 1220's and developed over a period of about 200-years; as a result, parts of the abbey were constructed adopting different architectural styles. The first stage of rebuilding was the east end, built in the grand ‘Early English' style, with three levels of elegant lancet windows. As money became available so work progressed; decorative piers, a line of beautifully carved arches, and high-level blind arcading followed. In the 1250's work on the transepts and crossing drove the abbey into debt, a problem compounded in the mid-1300's by the arrival of plague and recession. Thus it was that construction was not completed until the mid 15 th century. Remains of the west end of the abbey reveal details in the ‘Perpendicular' style, characterised by large windows and straight tracery. Judging by its ruins and its prominent position Whitby Abbey must have presented an imposing feature on the medieval landscape.
The abbey was dissolved by Henry VIII in 1539, one of the last of the great monastic houses to suffer in the period of the Dissolution. After the Benedictine monks had left the site it passed to the Cholmley family who disabused it during their 250-year tenure, plundering valuable building materials to construct a family mansion nearby. Despite the abbey itself remaining reasonably intact through the 17 th century, by the end of the 18 th century decades of neglect had clearly taken their toll. The nave, the south transept and a considerable portion of the west end had all, in their turn, collapsed. Constantly exposed to the elements, during a violent storm in the 1830's, the central tower over the crossing fell, also damaging the choir. To add insult to injury the German Fleet shelled the abbey in 1914.
Despite these many vicissitudes the abbey ruins remain a place of peace and tranquillity, quietly evocative of an earlier age when Whitby occupied an important place in the history of the early English church.