Tintern Abbey
This abbey, in Monmouthshire, England, was founded in 1131 by
Walter de Clare for Cistercian monks, who came from the Abbey of
Aumone, in the Diocese of Chartres, itself founded only ten years
before. Walter's son Gilbert, first earl of Pembroke, and probably
also his grandson Richard Strongbow, conqueror of Ireland under
Henry II, were buried at Tintern, the magnificent church of which
dates from the end of the thirteenth century. They abbey received
rich benefactions not only from the family of its founder but from
other noble houses; and lists of its possessions, both from the
taxation-roll of 1291, and at the time of the Dissolution under
Henry VIII, are given in detail by Dugdale. The accounts submitted
by the last abbot, Richard Wych, in 1535, place the net income at
under 200 pounds a year; and the abbey, containing at that time
thirteen monks, was suppressed under the Act of 1536 which
dissolved the smaller monasteries. The king granted it in 1537 to
Henry, Earl of Worcester, in whose family (afterwards dukes of
Beaufort) it remained until the sale of his Monmouthshire property
by the ninth duke, when it was acquired by the Crown.
The ruins of Tintern, which stands on the right bank of the river
Wye, backed by a semicircle of wooded hills, ranks with Fountains
Abbey in Yorkshire as the most beautiful in England. The church,
measuring 245 feet in length, with transepts of 110 feet, is
almost perfect, though roofless, the architecture being of the
transitional style from Early English to Decorated. The window-
tracery is especially fine. Hardly anything remains of the
domestic buildings of the abbey, the stone having been used for
cottages and farm buildings in the neighborhood.
D. O. HUNTER-BLAIR
Transcribed by Janet Grayson
From the Catholic Encyclopedia, copyright � 1913 by the
Encyclopedia Press, Inc. Electronic version copyright � 1996 by
New Advent, Inc., P.O. Box 281096, Denver, Colorado, USA, 80228.
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(www.knight.org/advent).
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effort aimed at placing the entire Catholic Encyclopedia 1913
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