Monastery information | |
---|---|
Full name | The Priory Church of the Holy Trinity, Beauvale |
Other names | Beauvale Charterhouse |
Order | Carthusian |
Established | 1343 |
Disestablished | 1539 |
Dedicated to | Holy Trinity |
People | |
Founder(s) | Nicholas de Cantiloup, Lord of Ilkeston |
Site | |
Location | Beauvale, Nottinghamshire, England |
Coordinates | 53°02′11″N1°16′02″W / 53.036424°N 1.267206°W Coordinates: 53°02′11″N1°16′02″W / 53.036424°N 1.267206°W |
Public access | yes |
Beauvale Priory (also known as Beauvale Charterhouse) was a Carthusian monastery in Beauvale, Nottinghamshire. It is a scheduled ancient monument.
The priory was founded in 1343 by Nicholas de Cantelupe (d.1355), in honour of the Blessed Trinity. The priory was originally built to be home to a prior and twelve monks. It was the third of nine houses of the Carthusian order established in England. The two earlier houses were established in Witham Friary and Hinton in Somerset. [1] The others were London Charterhouse, St. Anne's near Coventry, Kingston upon Hull and Mount Grace in Yorkshire, Epworth and Shene. [2] The Valor Ecclesiasticus of 1534 lists the priory as having an annual income of £227 8s., of which £196 6s. was left after expenses. At this time the priory was in control of the advowsons of the churches of Greasley and Selston in Nottinghamshire; Bonby in Lincolnshire; and Farnham in Yorkshire. [3]
Although concrete evidence remains scant, several claims have been made for Beauvale's role in shaping late medieval English spirituality: John P.H. Clark suggests that the author of the seminal mystical text The Cloud of Unknowing was probably a Carthusian of Beauvale Priory. [4] and Jonathan Hughes posits that Beauvale may have been an important centre for the study of English mystic Richard Rolle. [5]
Following England’s break from Rome, the Carthusians refused to accept King Henry VIII's supremacy over the church. Robert Lawrence, Prior of Beauvale, travelled to London in 1535 to see Thomas Cromwell in person in the hope of stopping the dissolution of his priory. Cromwell never saw Lawrence and he, along with two other Carthusian Priors who had made similar journeys, were imprisoned in the Tower of London as traitors. One of these was John Houghton, Lawrence's predecessor as Prior at Beauvale. Prior Lawrence was interrogated on 20 April but declared he could "not take our sovereign lord to be supreme head of the Church, but him that is by God the head of the Church, that is the bishop of Rome, as Ambrose, Jerome, and Augustine teach". The three Carthusians and a Brigittine monk from Syon Abbey were all tried on 28 April and charged with "verbal treason" for claiming King Henry was not the supreme head of the Church of England. The jury refused to find the four guilty as they felt "they did not act maliciously"; Cromwell, however, violently threatened the jury until they returned a guilty verdict. [3]
Prior Lawrence became one of a group known as the Carthusian Martyrs. He and his fellow prisoners were sentenced to death (to be hanged, drawn and quartered) and returned to the Tower until 4 May when they were taken to Tyburn for execution. The execution was made deliberately more "ghastly and revolting" to show the King's power and deter others. Prior Lawrence was executed wearing his monk's habit. The rope used to hang him was larger than usual to avoid fatally strangling him; thus ensuring he was still alive when he was butchered and mutilated, before finally being "quartered" (chopped into 4 pieces). [3]
Lawrence was created a saint by Pope Paul VI in 1970 as one of the Forty Martyrs of England and Wales.
The annual value of this monastery was just under £200, the limit for the suppression of the lesser monasteries; but by paying the heavy fine of £166 13s. 4d. the monks were able to postpone dissolution. This bargain was effected on 2 January 1537/38. [3]
Beauvale Priory was finally surrendered for dissolution on 18 July 1539. The surrender document was signed by the Prior, Thomas Woodcock, and seven other monks: John Langdale, William Welles, Alexander Lowthe, Edmund Garner, Robert Gowton (proctor), Thomas Leyghton, and Thomas Wallis. Prior Woodcock was awarded an annual pension of £26 13s. 4d. The priory and most of its possessions were granted in 1541 to Sir William Huse of London. The manor of Etwall, previously held by the priory, was granted to Sir John Porte in 1540. [3]
Some tiles and fragments of stained glass are now in St. Mary's Church, Greasley. [7] Two manuscripts associated with the library at Beauvale are also extant: Cambridge MS Mm 5.37, a copy of Richard Rolle's Incendium Amoris, and Bodleian Library MS Douce 114, a collection of Middle English translations of the vitae of Elizabeth of Spalbeek, Marie of Oignies, and Christina the Astonishing, a letter concerning Catherine of Siena, and Henry Suso's Horologium Sapientiae. [5]
There are still substantial remains of the buildings, and the whole site has been designated as a scheduled ancient monument, because of the range of features that survive, and their rarity value, for Beauvale was one of only nine Carthusian houses to be built in England. The monks were well respected, because they maintained their austere standards until the Dissolution. The site was one of the first to receive scheduled monument protection, on 10 April 1915, and the individual buildings were granted listed building status in 1952. [8] The remains of the Priory Church are Grade II* listed, while the Gatehouse and parts of the boundary wall are separately listed as Grade II buildings. [9] The site also includes the Abbey Farmhouse, which was built in the 16th century and extended in the 18th and 19th centuries, using material which was largely quarried from the priory. [10]
The ruin of Beauvale Priory was the setting for D.H. Lawrence's historical short story, "A Fragment of Stained Glass." [11]
The Carthusians, also known as the Order of Carthusians, are a Latin enclosed religious order of the Catholic Church. The order was founded by Bruno of Cologne in 1084 and includes both monks and nuns. The order has its own rule, called the Statutes, and their life combines both eremitical and cenobitic monasticism. The motto of the Carthusians is Stat crux dum volvitur orbis, Latin for "The Cross is steady while the world turns". The Carthusians retain a unique form of liturgy known as the Carthusian Rite.
Eastwood is a former coal mining town in the Broxtowe district of Nottinghamshire, England, 8 miles (13 km) northwest of Nottingham and 10 miles (16 km) northeast of Derby on the border between Nottinghamshire and Derbyshire. Mentioned in Domesday Book, it expanded rapidly during the Industrial Revolution. The Midland Railway was formed here and it is the birthplace of D. H. Lawrence. The distinctive dialect of East Midlands English is extensively spoken, in which the name of the town is pronounced.
Nottinghamshire is a county that is situated in the East Midlands of England. The county has history within Palaeolithic period, dating anywhere between 500,000 and 10,000 b.c.e., as well as early Anglo-Saxon communities, dating to 600 c.e. Furthermore, the county has significance in the political aspects of English history, particularly within intercommunal fighting, and its economics is historically centred around coal and textiles.
Augustine Webster, O.Cart was an English Catholic martyr. He was the prior of Our Lady of Melwood, a Carthusian house at Epworth, on the Isle of Axholme, in north Lincolnshire, in 1531. His feast day is 4 May.
John Houghton, OCart was a Catholic priest of the Carthusian order and the first martyr to die as a result of the Act of Supremacy by King Henry VIII of England. He was also the first of the Carthusians to die as a martyr. As one of the Carthusian Martyrs of London he is among the Forty Martyrs of England and Wales.
Mount Grace Priory is a monastery in the parish of East Harlsey, North Yorkshire, England. Set in woodlands within the North York Moors National Park, it is represented today by the best preserved and most accessible ruins among the nine houses of the Carthusian Order, which existed in England in the Middle Ages and were known as charterhouses.
William Exmew was an English Catholic priest and Carthusian hermit. He was hanged, drawn, and quartered at Tyburn and is honoured as a martyr by the Catholic Church. Exmew and his brother Carthusian martyrs were beatified by Pope Leo XIII on 9 December 1886.
Sebastian Newdigate, O.Cart was the seventh child of John Newdigate, Sergeant-at-law. He spent his early life at court, and later became a Carthusian monk. He was executed for treason on 19 June 1535 for his refusal to accept Henry VIII's assumption of supremacy over the Church in England. His death was considered a martyrdom, and he was beatified by the Catholic Church.
The Carthusian Martyrs of London were the monks of the London Charterhouse, the monastery of the Carthusian Order in the City of London who were put to death by the English state in a period lasting from the 4 May 1535 until the 20 September 1537. The method of execution was hanging, disembowelling while still alive and then quartering. Others were imprisoned and left to starve to death. The group also includes two monks who were brought to that house from the Charterhouses of Beauvale and Axholme and similarly dealt with. The total was 18 men, all of whom have been formally recognized by the Catholic Church as martyrs.
Thetford Priory is a Cluniac monastic house in Thetford, Norfolk, England. Founded in 1103 by Roger Bigod of Norfolk, Thetford was one of the most important monasteries of East Anglia.
Robert Lawrence, OCart was one of the Forty Martyrs of England and Wales. He was hanged, drawn, and quartered at Tyburn for declining to sign the Oath of Supremacy. His feast day is 4 May.
Lenton Priory was a Cluniac monastic house in Nottinghamshire, founded by William Peverel circa 1102-8. The priory was granted a large endowment of property in Nottinghamshire and Derbyshire by its founder, which 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.
Shelford Priory is a former Augustinian Monastery located in the village of Shelford, Nottinghamshire, United Kingdom. The priory was founded by Ralph Haunselyn around 1160–80 and dissolved in 1536. Little remains of the original priory. Following dissolution it was granted to Michael Stanhope, and c.1600 Shelford Manor was constructed on the site. The manor was fortified and then partially destroyed during the English Civil War. The house was reconstructed c.1678, however, it was altered in the 18th and 19th centuries. It is now known as Shelford Manor and is a private residence.
Greasley is a civil parish north west of Nottingham in Nottinghamshire, England. Although it is thought there was once a village called Greasley, there is no settlement of that name today as it was destroyed by the Earl of Rutland. The built up areas in the parish are Beauvale, Giltbrook, Moorgreen, Newthorpe, Watnall and parts of Eastwood, Kimberley and Nuthall. There is also a small hamlet known as Bog-End. The parish is one of the largest in Nottinghamshire at 8.11 square miles (21.0 km2), and the 2001 UK Census reported it had a total population of 10,467, increasing to 11,014 at the 2011 Census.
Beauvale, or Beauvale Newthorpe, is a village in Nottinghamshire, England. It is located 1 mile to the east of Eastwood. It is in Greasley parish. Beauvale Priory is the remains of a Carthusian monastery, or Charterhouse, founded in 1343 by Nicholas de Cantilupe. The extant remains include part of the church and a three-storey tower house, which may have been the Prior's lodging.
Axholme Charterhouse or Axholme Priory, also Melwood Priory or Low Melwood Priory, North Lincolnshire, is one of the ten medieval Carthusian houses (charterhouses) in England. It was established in 1397/1398 by Thomas Mowbray, Earl of Nottingham and later Duke of Norfolk. The house was centred on a pre-existing chapel on the present Low Melwood Farm, between Owston Ferry and Epworth in the Isle of Axholme, which according to a papal bull of 1398 "was called anciently the Priory of the Wood".
Launde Priory is a former Augustinian priory in Leicestershire, England. Its successor Launde Abbey is used as a conference and retreat centre by the Church of England dioceses of Leicester and Peterborough.
Blyth Priory was a priory in Nottinghamshire, England, dedicated to St Mary the Virgin.
Moorgreen is a hamlet in the Broxtowe district of Nottinghamshire, England. It is 115 miles (185 km) north west of London, 7 miles (11 km) north west of the city of Nottingham, and 1+1⁄4 miles (2 km) north east of the nearest town Eastwood. It is a linear settlement within the civil parish of Greasley.
Greasley is a civil parish in the Borough of Broxtowe, Nottinghamshire, England. The parish contains 30 listed buildings that are recorded in the National Heritage List for England. Of these, two are listed at Grade II*, the middle of the three grades, and the others are at Grade II, the lowest grade. The parish contains the settlements of Beauvale, Moorgreen and Watnall and the surrounding area. Most of the listed buildings are houses, cottages and associated structures, farmhouses and farm buildings. The others include the remains of a fortified manor house, a church and a former chapel, and a school.
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