THE MONASTERIES
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Religious Houses

Glastonbury remains the most famous monastery in England and is a centre of attraction for pilgrimages and visitors from all over the world. Legends have so confused the early history of this ancient monastery that it is difficult to be certain about its origins. That Joseph of Arimathea came here with the Holy Grail or planted the Holy Thorn is barely possible but extremely doubtful. St Patrick, more probably, may have been connected with the monastic settlement after the Romans had left Britain, and more certain still is the link with the Saxons and King Ine. Later Saxon kings made generous gifts to Glastonbury, and by the time of the Norman Conquest the monastery was firmly established. For the next five centuries it was an important centre for pilgrims drawn there by a firm belief in the legends of the Holy Grail and the Holy Thorn, and that King Arthur and St Patrick were buried there. The monastery flourished with gifts of land, property and money from kings and queens and other generous benefactors. The buildings were extended and improved continuously, and must have been exceptionally impressive. The great church was of vast size and splendour. The Abbot was one of the most important churchmen in the land and a member of the House of Lords, In 1539 the abbey was closed down, the last Abbot being hanged for refusing to give way to the King's demands. All the abbey property was taken over by the King, and the church and monastic buildings were broken down. The ruins stand, a reminder both of the grandeur of a great monastery and its church and also of the havoc caused by religious differences and bitter disputes.

Of the other Benedictine monasteries in Somerset, Bath was the most important for its association with the bishopric. The abbey church survived the dissolution of the monastery and remains an impressive and distinguished building. At Athelney, where King Alfred founded a monastery to commemorate his victory over the Danes and the debt he owed to his refuge there in 878, nothing is left of the church or other buildings; but at Muchelney, not far away, there are some interesting surviving buildings of another monastery founded in Saxon times.

From the time of the foundation of our earliest monasteries, a number of new or reformed Rules had been introduced. Of these the most famous was the Cistercian Order which settled in Somerset at Cleeve. Their ideal was to seek out a remote area in which they could devote themselves, in addition to their normal duties as monks, to hard physical labour in the cultivation of waste land, far from the bustle and noise of cities and towns. The monastery they built at Cleeve was founded in the year 1190. It never became either large or rich, and when it was closed down in 1537 there were only 17 monks 'of honest life who keep hospitality'. It was one of the few monasteries against which local people felt no hostility and even requested that it might be allowed to remain. This may have helped to protect the buildings, though the church, for which there was no local need, was demolished. At Cleeve one can still recapture something of the atmosphere of peace and tranquillity in what are still quiet rural surroundings, in a place where for nearly 350 years, religious men passed their lives in work and prayer. The plan of Cleeve has been selected to provide an example of the pattern of monastic buildings, but a visit will help even more towards a fuller appreciation of the life and work of a monk.

Plan of Cleeve Abbey
An Order which differed considerably from all others was the Augustinian. Founded primarily to provide for priests serving town churches and their dependent chapels, the successors of the Saxon ministers, the Augustinian Order was introduced into England in the early twelfth century. Life in most monasteries involved withdrawal from, and renunciation of, the outside world, But priests who carried on the pastoral work of parish churches and chapels also felt the need for community life; and the Augustinian Order provided this whilst permitting the canons, as these men were called, to go out and take services in the churches of their district. They built their new monasteries outside the walls of the towns they served and eventually established their own monastic churches, gradually handing over their duties as local clergy to vicars whom they appointed and who lived in closer contact with the people they served. The Augustinians became a prosperous Order and built fine churches for their monasteries, but few of these have survived. At Bristol the cathedral is the former Augustinian church, but in Taunton the Priory and its church were totally destroyed at the Dissolution.

Of the nine Carthusian monasteries in England the first was established at Witham, in Somerset, by Henry II in 1180 as part of his penance for the murder of Thomas Becket. The Carthusians were the most austere of all monastic Orders, living a life of simple poverty, in separate cells built into a quadrangle surrounding a garden from which they produced vegetables to supplement their meagre diet. Another Carthusian house was founded at Hinton in 1232, the second in England, on the same plan as Witham. This type of monastery was called a Charterhouse after the name of the original foundation at Chartreuse in France.

The only example of a Cluniac monastery in Somerset was founded at Montacute about the end of the eleventh century, by one of the reformed Orders of monks coming from Cluny in France. Nothing now remains except the gatehouse converted into a farm.