The Battle of Hastings was fought on 14 October 1066 between the Norman-French army of William, the Duke of Normandy, and an English army under the Anglo-Saxon King Harold Godwinson, beginning the Norman Conquest of England. It took place approximately 7 mi (11 km) northwest of Hastings, close to the present-day town of Battle, East Sussex, and was a decisive Norman victory.
Kirkstall Abbey is a ruined Cistercian monastery in Kirkstall, north-west of Leeds city centre in West Yorkshire, England. It is set in a public park on the north bank of the River Aire. It was founded c. 1152. It was disestablished during the Dissolution of the Monasteries under Henry VIII.
St Benet's Abbey was a medieval monastery of the Order of Saint Benedict, also known as St Benet's at Holme or Hulme. It was situated at Cow Holm, Horning, on the River Bure within the Broads in Norfolk, England. St Benet is a medieval English version of the name of St Benedict of Nursia, hailed as the founder of western monasticism. At the period of the Dissolution of the Monasteries the abbey's possessions were in effect seized by the crown and assigned to the diocese of Norwich. Though the monastery was supposed to continue as a community, within a few years at least the monks had dispersed. Today there remain only ruins.
The Abbey Church of Waltham Holy Cross and St Lawrence, also known as Waltham Abbey, is the parish church of the town of Waltham Abbey, Essex, England. It has been a place of worship since the 7th century. The present building dates mainly from the early 12th century and is an example of Norman architecture. To the east of the existing church are traces of an enormous eastward enlargement of the building, begun following the re-foundation of the abbey in 1177. In the Late Middle Ages, Waltham was one of the largest church buildings in England and a major site of pilgrimage; in 1540 it was the last religious community to be closed during the Dissolution of the Monasteries. It is still an active parish church for the town, and is a grade I listed building.
Ramsey Abbey was a Benedictine abbey in Ramsey, Huntingdonshire, England. It was founded about AD 969 and dissolved in 1539.
Battle is a town and civil parish in the district of Rother in East Sussex, England. It lies 50 miles (80 km) south-east of London, 27 miles (43 km) east of Brighton and 20 miles (32 km) east of Lewes. Hastings is to the south-east and Bexhill-on-Sea to the south. Battle is in the designated High Weald Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. The parish population was 6,673 according to the 2011 Census and 6,800 in the 2021 census. Battle contains the site of, and is named after, the Battle of Hastings, where William, Duke of Normandy, defeated King Harold II to become William I of England in 1066. For some 250 years after 1066, official documents referred to the town as (Latin) Bellum or (French) Bataille.
Abbotsbury Abbey, dedicated to Saint Peter, was a Benedictine monastery in the village of Abbotsbury in Dorset, England. The abbey was founded in the 11th century by King Cnut's thegn Orc and his wife Tola, who handsomely endowed the monastery with lands in the area. The abbey prospered and became a local centre of power, controlling eight manor houses and villages. During the later Middle Ages, the abbey suffered much misfortune. In the time of the dissolution of the monasteries, the last abbot surrendered the abbey and the site became the property of Sir Giles Strangways.
Senlac Hill or Senlac Ridge is generally accepted as the location in which Harold Godwinson deployed his army for the Battle of Hastings on 14 October 1066. It is located near what is now the town of Battle, East Sussex. The name Senlac was popularised by the Victorian historian E. A. Freeman, based solely on a description of the battle by the Anglo-Norman chronicler Orderic Vitalis. Freeman went on to suggest that the Normans nicknamed the area Blood lake as a pun on the English Sand lake.
Bermondsey Abbey was an English Benedictine monastery. Although generally regarded as having been founded in the 11th century, it had a precursor mentioned in the early 8th century. It was centred on what is now Bermondsey Square, the site of Bermondsey Market, Bermondsey, in the London Borough of Southwark, southeast London, England.
Sawley Abbey was an abbey of Cistercian monks in the village of Sawley, Lancashire, in England. Created as a daughter-house of Newminster Abbey, it existed from 1149 until its dissolution in 1536, during the reign of King Henry VIII.
Douai Abbey is a Benedictine Abbey at Upper Woolhampton, near Thatcham, in the English county of Berkshire, situated within the Roman Catholic Diocese of Portsmouth. Monks from the monastery of St. Edmund's, in Douai, France, came to Woolhampton in 1903 when the community left France as a result of anti-clerical legislation. The abbey church is listed Grade II* on the National Heritage List for England.
Cleeve Abbey is a medieval monastery located near the village of Washford, in Somerset, England. It is a Grade I listed building and has been scheduled as an ancient monument.
Cerne Abbey was a Benedictine monastery founded in 987 in the town now called Cerne Abbas, Dorset, by Æthelmær the Stout.
St John's Abbey, also called Colchester Abbey, was a Benedictine monastic institution in Colchester, Essex, founded in 1095. It was dissolved in 1539. Most of the abbey buildings were subsequently demolished to construct a large private house on the site, which was itself destroyed in fighting during the 1648 siege of Colchester. The only substantial remnant is the elaborate gatehouse, while the foundations of the abbey church were only rediscovered in 2010.
Battle Abbey School is a private coeducational day and boarding school in the small town of Battle, East Sussex, England. The senior school occupies part of the town's ruined abbey complex, and it is from here that the school derives its name. Originally formed as St Etheldreda's, in 1989 Glengorse and Hydneye was merged into the school.
Alton Abbey is an Anglican Benedictine monastery in the village of Beech, near Alton, Hampshire, England. The abbey is not far from one of Hampshire's highest points, King's Hill. The community was founded by the Revd Charles Plomer Hopkins in 1884, as the "Society of Saint Paul", in Rangoon (Burma) and Calcutta (India) to work with destitute or distressed merchant seafarers and their chaplains.
Swineshead Abbey was an abbey in Swineshead, Lincolnshire.
Sussex in the High Middle Ages includes the history of Sussex from the Norman Conquest in 1066 until the death of King John, considered by some to be the last of the Angevin kings of England, in 1216. It was during the Norman period that Sussex achieved its greatest importance in comparison with other English counties. Throughout the High Middle Ages, Sussex was on the main route between England and Normandy, and the lands of the Anglo-Norman nobility in what is now western France. The growth in Sussex's population, the importance of its ports and the increased colonisation of the Weald were all part of changes as significant to Sussex as those brought by the neolithic period, by the Romans and the Saxons. Sussex also experienced the most radical and thorough reorganisation of land in England, as the Normans divided the county into five tracts of lands called rapes. Although Sussex may have been divided into rapes earlier in its history, under the Normans they were clearly administrative and fiscal units. Before the Norman Conquest Sussex had the greatest concentration of lands belonging to the family of Earl Godwin. To protect against rebellion or invasion, the scattered Saxon estates in Sussex were consolidated into the rapes as part of William the Conqueror's 'Channel march'.
