Andover Priory

Last updated

Andover Priory
Monastery information
Full namePriory of Andover
Order Benedictine
Establishedpost 1066
Disestablished1414
Mother house St. Florent, Saumur
Controlled churches St. Mary, Andover; Foxcote
People
Founder(s) William I of England
Site
Location Andover, Hampshire, England
Coordinates 51°12′36″N1°28′42″W / 51.210103°N 1.478321°W / 51.210103; -1.478321
Visible remainsone wall beside the current church
Public accessyes

Andover Priory was an alien priory of Benedictine monks in Andover, Hampshire, England.

Alien priories were religious establishments in England, such as a monastery or convent, which were under the control of another religious house outside England. Usually the mother-house was in France.

Andover, Hampshire Town in Hampshire, England

Andover is a town in the English county of Hampshire. The town is on the River Anton, a major source of the Test, 18 miles (29 km) west of the town of Basingstoke, both major rail stops. It is 15 miles (24 km) NNW of the city of Winchester, 25 miles (40 km) north of the city of Southampton and 65 miles (105 km) WSW of London. Andover is twinned with the towns of Redon in France, Goch in Germany, and Andover, Massachusetts in the United States.

Hampshire County of England

Hampshire is a county on the southern coast of England. The county town is the city of Winchester. Its two largest cities, Southampton and Portsmouth, are administered separately as unitary authorities; the rest of the county is governed by Hampshire County Council.

Contents

Foundation

After the conquest, William I bestowed several gifts on the Benedictine abbey of Abbey of Saint-Florent de Saumur, including the church of Andover, with a hide and 14 acres (57,000 m2) of land, tithes of all the demesne lands in the parish, and extensive pasture rights, with wood for fuel, for fencing and for building purposes. The gift was renewed by William Rufus in 1100, he also directed that all churches built under the mother church of Andover should either be utterly destroyed or held by the monks of St. Florent. The abbey establishing the priory with a colony of monks soon after the church was given to them. The homes of the monks are described as being juxta ecclesiam (beside the church).

Abbey of Saint-Florent de Saumur abbey located in Maine-et-Loire, in France

The Abbey of Saint-Florent de Saumur, Saumur Les Saint-Florent or Saint-Florent-le-Jeune is a Benedictine abbey in Anjou founded in the 11th century near Saumur, France. It is the successor of the abbey of Saint-Florent Old or Mont Glonne which was abandoned by its monks during raids of the Vikings.

An Alien Priory

As an alien priory (i.e., the dependency of a French mother-house) Andover would have had a certain inbuilt instability of status before the English crown, especially whenever there were hostilities between France and England, and particularly during the Hundred Years' War. Its fate would have shared the fluctuating fortunes of every alien priory.

Hundred Years War Series of conflicts and wars between England and France during the 14th and 15th-century

The Hundred Years' War was a series of conflicts waged from 1337 to 1453 by the House of Plantagenet, rulers of the Kingdom of England, against the French House of Valois, over the right to rule the Kingdom of France. Each side drew many allies into the war. It was one of the most notable conflicts of the Middle Ages, in which five generations of kings from two rival dynasties fought for the throne of the largest kingdom in Western Europe. The war marked both the height of chivalry and its subsequent decline, and the development of strong national identities in both countries.

At the dissolution of alien priories in 1414 the priory was granted to Winchester College. The college was obliged to pay yearly pensions of forty-five marks to the Crown, twenty marks to Joanna of Navarre, the widow of Henry IV and fifty-two marks to the ex-prior, Nicholas Gwyn.

Winchester College Boarding school in Winchester, England (UK)

Winchester College is an independent boarding school for boys in the British public school tradition, situated in Winchester, Hampshire. It has existed in its present location for over 600 years. It is the oldest of the original seven English public schools defined by the Clarendon Commission and regulated by the Public Schools Act 1868.

Joan of Navarre, Queen of England Duchess consort of Brittany

Joan of Navarre, also known as Joanna was Duchess of Brittany by marriage to Duke John IV, and later Queen of England by marriage to King Henry IV. She served as regent of Brittany from 1399 until 1403 during the minority of her son. She also served as regent of England during the absence of her stepson, Henry V, in 1415. Four years later he imprisoned her and confiscated her money and land. Joan was released in 1422, shortly before Henry V's death.

Henry IV of England King of England

Henry IV, also known as Henry Bolingbroke, was King of England from 1399 to 1413. He asserted the claim of his grandfather King Edward III, a maternal grandson of Philip IV of France, to the Kingdom of France.

A piece of ivy-covered wall next to the present parish church is believed to be the only surviving remnant of the priory.

Related Research Articles

St Neots Priory was a Benedictine monastery beside the town of St Neots in the historic county of Huntingdonshire, now a non-metropolitan district in the English county of Cambridgeshire.

Folkestone Priory was a pre-Reformation Benedictine monastery at Folkestone in the English county of Kent. The priory church survives as the present parish church. It was the successor to Folkestone Abbey, an Anglo-Saxon nunnery on a different site.

Lenton Priory

Lenton Priory was a Cluniac monastic house, founded by William Peverel in the early 12th century. The exact date of foundation is unknown but 1102-8 is frequently quoted. The priory was granted a large endowment of property in Nottinghamshire and Derbyshire by its founder, however part of this property became the cause of violent disagreement following its seizure by the crown and its reassignment to Lichfield Cathedral. The priory was home mostly to French monks until the late 14th century when the priory was freed from the control of its foreign mother-house. From the 13th-century the priory struggled financially and was noted for "its poverty and indebtedness". The priory was dissolved as part of King Henry VIII's Dissolution of the Monasteries.

Alan fitz Flaad was a Breton knight, probably recruited as a mercenary by Henry I, in his conflicts with his brothers. After Henry became King of England, Alan became an assiduous courtier and obtained large estates in Norfolk, Sussex, Shropshire, and elsewhere in the Midlands, including the feudal barony and castle of Oswestry in Shropshire. His duties included supervision of the Welsh border. He is now noted as the progenitor of the FitzAlan family, the Earls of Arundel (1267–1580), and the House of Stuart, although his family connections were long a matter of conjecture and controversy.

Priory of St. Andrews of the Ards

The Priory of St. Andrews of the Ards (Blackabbey) was a Benedictine Abbey at Stogursey in Somerset.

Abbeys and priories in Hampshire lists abbeys, priories, friaries or other monastic religious houses in Hampshire, England.

Andwell Priory is an alien priory of Benedictine monks in Andwell, Hampshire, England.

Dunster Priory

Dunster Priory was established as a Benedictine monastery around 1100 in Dunster, Somerset, England.

Cranborne Priory priory in Cranborne, Dorset, UK

Cranborne Priory was a priory in Cranborne in Dorset, England. The priory church survives as Cranborne's parish church, the Church of St Mary and St Bartholomew, and is a Grade I listed building, with parts of the building dating back to the 12th century.

St. Mary Magdalen Priory, Lincoln

St. Mary Magdalen was a Benedictine priory in Lincoln, England. Along with Sandtoft Priory and Hanes Cell, it was a Lincolnshire cell of St Mary's Abbey in York, England. A surviving building, once owned by the priory, is Monks' Abbey, Lincoln.

Everdon Priory was a priory in Northamptonshire, England. The village of Everdon is located about 6 km south-east of the town of Daventry.

Blyth Priory

Blyth Priory was a priory in Nottinghamshire, England, dedicated to St Mary the Virgin.

Blakenham Priory was an estate in monastic ownership in the late Middle Ages, located at Great Blakenham in Suffolk, England.

Wootton Wawen Priory was an alien priory in Wootton Wawen, Warwickshire, England.

Sele Priory was a medieval monastic house in West Sussex, England.

St. James Priory, Derby

St. James Priory, also known as Derby Cluniac Priory, was a Benedictine monastery, formerly located in what is now Derby City Centre. It existed until the Dissolution of the Monasteries.

Edith Weston Priory

Edith Weston Priory was a small alien house of Benedictine monks in Edith Weston, Rutland. The French parent house of Abbey of Saint-Georges, Boscherville was founded by Ralf de Tanquerville, chamberlain to William the Conqueror, about the year 1050. By 1114 his son William donated the church and manor at Edith Weston, and a small cell of monks was set up to collect the rents and intercede for the founder's soul.

Stoke-by-Clare Priory was a Benedictine monastery in Stoke-by-Clare, in Suffolk, an alien priory, dependent on Bec Abbey, in Normandy. Reinstituted in 1124, the Priory was suppressed in 1415.

References