10 Amazing Abbeys & Priories

Henry VIII was a bit of a rotter but one thing he did bestow on us was romantic ruination courtesy of his Dissolution of the Monasteries. Here are the best monastic memoirs from the county of Berkshire

- Stephen Roberts

10. KINTBURY ABBEY (ANGLO-SAXON)

I’m starting at Kintbury for two reasons. We think of monasteries as post-Norman Conquest, however, there were older, Anglo-Saxon ones, of which Kintbury was reputedly an example. You also won’t find Kintbury today, as sometimes these places are transient. We know about Kintbury because of Wulfgar’s will (AD 930s), which granted land at Inkpen to it. The abbey may have lapsed as there is evidence of a scheme to re-establish it with a nunnery in the mid-12th century, but nothing appears to have come of this.

9. ANKERWYCKE PRIORY (BENEDICTINE/ NATIONAL TRUST)

And so, on to the remains. Ankerwycke Priory (or St Mary’s) at Runnymede is just crumbling walls today, but a place of resonance where a nunnery once stood. Built during Henry II’s reign, following its dissolution, it was privately-owned and patched up before falling into disrepair from the 19th century, leaving today’s overgrown walls. There is romance here though. The Ankerwycke Yew is said to be 2,500 years old and could be the tree beneath which Henry VIII courted the ill-fated Anne Boleyn.

8. Sandleford Priory (Austin Canons)

Another fascination is how things change. Sandleford Priory in Greenham is a Grade I-listed mainly late-18th century country house, but built on the site of an old monastery, the former chapel of which is today a part of St Gabriel’s School. The small Augustinian priory was certainly here around 1200 but come 1440 the establishment was already in a parlous state and was therefore dissolved within the next 40 years: not one we can blame on Henry VIII. Prior Simon Dam was turfed out for ‘indiscretions’ (ooh er).