Here are the pics (including the grave!) of Fountains from last month. We will probably go again between Christmas and New Year, especially if we have a snowfall or heavy frost, as the gardens at Studley Royal are beautiful in the snow and ice.


Fountains Abbey is one of the greatest religious houses in the north, and arguably one of the greatest in England. Founded in 1132 by a group of exiled Benedictines from St Mary’s in York, the house began with thirteen monks who switched from Orders and became Cistercian. The monastery owned 500 acres of adjoining land and many farms elsewhere throughout northern England. Its main revenue was wool, which was traded with the Netherlands. Fountains, and its sister-house Rievaulx, were staggeringly wealthy houses during most of the medieval period.


The monastery was dissolved in 1539 and its lands sold the following year. Later, the estate was divided up and sold again to the Aislabie family at the neighbouring estate of Studley Royal. The Aislabies incorporated the ruins into a water garden during the 18th century. The Aislabie house at Studley Royal was surrounded by a deer park of medieval date. The deer park remains, but the house burned down in 1716, was rebuilt and again gutted by fire in 1946, after which it was demolished.


This is a small and very incomplete tour of the abbey. There’s a plan of the abbey here.



The west front of Fountains Abbey as you come down the hill into the valley.




Monks!!! Not really. Local schools send their kids to Fountains and they have to dress up in Cistercian robes while they wander around. Behind the kids you can see the long building of the undercroft, and the church (on the left).




This is the River Skell, which is slightly to the south of the abbey. There’s no drain at Fountains; the monastic toilets emptied straight into the river. The guesthouse is on the left; beyond the bridge you can see the arches of the dormitory windows.




The Galilee Porch on the west front. I’m not sure why it’s called a Galilee Porch, other than the fact that Jesus lived in Galilee. The porch was also known as a Paradise. Women and penitents were allowed into the porch, corpses were laid out here before burial (in effect, it’s a version of the lych-gate), and monks gathered here before a procession.




The nave and the huge east window. The choir (area in front of the High Altar – where the grass is a bit darker and there’s a grey patch on the ground) was extended in the 13th century by the abbot John of York, so the church is longer than usual.




The nave, looking south-west across the south transept. Huby’s Tower is part of the north transept, while there are two chantry chapels in the south transept.




The north transept and Huby’s Tower. That’s Amy looking up LOL. Marmaduke Huby (isn’t that a great name!) was one of the last abbots of Fountains. A personal friend of Henry VIII, he built the tower shortly before the Dissolution began. When he left Fountains, he built a house in Ripon and also endowed a school and a little chapel.




Me in the grave. The High Altar is just behind me (the tiled dais), and you can see three of the Nine Altars in the Lady Chapel behind that (the three alcoves in the back wall).




The grave! It was wet and muddy so I didn’t lie down in it. If it’s dry and there’s no one around, I find it quite restful to lie in the grave and stare up at the sky. Yes, I am weird.




Looking south through the Lady Chapel, known here as the Chapel of Nine Altars. I didn’t get a pic of it this time, but there’s a sculpture of an angel covering over a crack in one of the window arches on the inside of the church. Outside, the crack is covered by a Green Man – ecclesiastical symbol inside, pagan symbol outside.




The undercroft, domain of the cellarer, built from 1160. Wine, beer and foodstuffs would have been stored here. Bats and pigeons roost here now. Some of the pillars have some very pretty decoration on them, as if the stonemasons were practicing their designs. Above the undercroft were the dormitories for the lay brothers who tended the sheep and did other manual labour.




Looking east across the cloister towards the chapter house (the three central arches). You can see the central lavabo to the left, in the middle of the cloister. The church (south transept on the left, Lady Chapel central) is the taller building, and the ruins on the right belong to the abbot’s lodgings.




The stairs to the monks’ dormitory, which was on the left. The room at the top right of the staircase is the muniment room, which used to contain all the monastery’s records and deeds of bequests, wills, etc. It’s above the warming house so was nice and warm for a third of the year.




East front of the abbey in the mist. The best view of the east is when you walk around the water gardens and approach it from the other side of the park. You go around a lake and suddenly the abbey slides into view. On a sunny day or a very crisp and clear winter’s day, it’s a magnificent sight. The day we went, it was a bit mucky and drizzly so we didn’t walk all the way around; plus this was the last shot on the camera!




Fountains Mill, the oldest Cistercian mill in Europe and the oldest working corn-mill in England – it’s been producing flour continuously for more than 850 years.




Fountains Hall, an Elizabethan manor house, built in 1598-1604 mainly from stone robbed out of the abbey. It was rented out to people when the estate was owned by the Aislabies (who had their own house at Studley Royal), and at one point the house fell into disrepair and was used for storing farm equipment. It was restored in the 1920s and during WW2 it was a home for evacuee children.




Classical-style ‘temple’, one of about half a dozen 18th century follies set in the water gardens of Studley Royal. The head of the Aislabie family at this time was a Tory MP, John Aislabie, who became Chancellor of the Exchequer. He promoted investment in the South Sea Company in order to pull Britain out of massive debts, but the company collapsed (‘the South Sea Bubble’) and caused the biggest stock market crash to date. He was expelled from Parliament and retired in disgrace to Yorkshire, where he spent the rest of his life landscaping the grounds around the abbey.


Fountains is a UNESCO World Heritage site and in the care of both English Heritage and the National Trust.