unless otherwise stated.
Rievaulx Abbey,
Yorkshire, England.
Photo: 8 September 2012.
Source: Own work.
(Wikimedia Commons)
Rievaulx Abbey.
Photo: 8 September 2012.
Source: Own work.
(Wikimedia Commons)
Rievaulx Abbey was founded in 1132 by twelve Monks from Clairvaux Abbey, France, as a mission for the colonisation of the North of England and Scotland. It was the first Cistercian Abbey in the North. With time, it became one of the great Cistercian Abbeys of Yorkshire, second only to Fountains Abbey in fame.
Rievaulx Abbey at Dawn.
The Presbytery, South Transept,
Chapter House foundations
and wall of The Infirmary.
Photo: 2011.
Source: http://www.wyrdlight.com.
Author: Antony McCallum.
Attribution: WyrdLight.com.
(Wikimedia Commons)
Ruins of Rievaulx Abbey.
Photo: 23 August 2008.
Source: Own work.
Author: Photograph by Mike Peel (www.mikepeel.net).
Please attribute using name and website URL
(as per the author line above).
(Wikimedia Commons)
The remote location was ideal for the Cistercians, whose desire was to follow a strict life of Prayer and self-sufficiency with little contact with the outside world.
It was one of the wealthiest Abbeys in England and was dissolved by King Henry VIII of England in 1538. Its ruins are a tourist attraction.
It was one of the wealthiest Abbeys in England and was dissolved by King Henry VIII of England in 1538. Its ruins are a tourist attraction.
Rievaulx Abbey, Yorkshire, England.
Photo: 8 September 2012.
Source: Own work by mattbuck.
(Wikimedia Commons)
Rievaulx Abbey.
Photo: 2007.
Source: Own work.
Author: Tilman2007.
(Wikimedia Commons)
At that time (1538), there were said to be seventy-two buildings, occupied by an Abbot and twenty-one Monks, attended by one hundred and two servants, with an income of £351 a year. It also had a prototype blast furnace at Laskill, producing cast iron as efficiently as a modern blast furnace. According to Gerry McDonnell (archeo-metallurgist of the University of Bradford), the closure of Rievaulx delayed the Industrial Revolution for two and a half centuries.
Henry ordered the buildings to be rendered uninhabitable and stripped of valuables such as lead. The Abbey site was granted to the Earl of Rutland, one of Henry's advisers, until it passed to the Duncombe family.
Henry ordered the buildings to be rendered uninhabitable and stripped of valuables such as lead. The Abbey site was granted to the Earl of Rutland, one of Henry's advisers, until it passed to the Duncombe family.
The Kyrie Eleison
(Orbis Factor),
Mass Setting XI,
is used on most Sundays
throughout The Liturgical Year.
The Monks at Rievaulx Abbey would have sung this.
Available on YouTube at
