Exploring Kent's Past

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Monument details

Summary

Benedictine nunnery founded as an alien priory circa 1148 became independent after 1227 and was dissolved 1521-2. Fragments of rubble walling and precinct wall remain. Excavation have revealed the layout of the buildings. The church consisted of nave and quire with North and South transepts. The claustral range was arranged to the South with the chapter house and warming room in the East range, the frater in the South range, (part of which survived built into cottages demolished in 1964), and the West range. The reredorter was a separate building at the South-East corner of the cloisters.The earthwork traces of part of a large embanked rectilinear enclosure, possibly the marking the precinct wall and further less clear earthworks (to the north) were seen at the location of the priory. These earthworks were mapped from aerial photographs and Envionment Agency lidar imagery as part of the English Heritage: Hoo Peninsula Landscape Project.

Monument Types

• BENEDICTINE NUNNERY (BENEDICTINE NUNNERY, Medieval - 1148 AD to 1521 AD)

Full description

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Benedictine nunnery founded as an alien priory circa 1148 became independent after 1227 and was dissolved 1521-2. Fragments of rubble walling and precinct wall remain. Excavation have revealed the layout of the buildings. The church consisted of nave and quire with North and South transepts. The claustral range was arranged to the South with the chapter house and warming room in the East range, the frater in the South range, (part of which survived built into cottages demolished in 1964), and the West range. The reredorter was a separate building at the South-East corner of the cloisters (information from the Heritage Gateway site).

References include: OS card/NAR entries (1-22), relevant references from field reports (23-26) and site photographs (27-39).


From the National Heritage List for England:
The monument includes the alien Benedictine Priory of St Mary, situated on level ground c.2km from the south bank of the River Thames. This includes the church, the cloister, east, west and south ranges, the reredorter and drain, the cemetery to the east of the church, the footings and foundations of asociated monastic buildings and the ground in between.

Abbey Farm farmhouse is situated in the south west corner of the cloister and has incorporated the standing remains of the west range and the north and west walls of the frater. These lie to the south of the cloister garth, or
courtyard, and are built of stone and flint up to 0.9m thick. Part of the south wall of the church is upstanding on the north side of the cloister garth and measures 0.7m thick, 4m long and 1.5m high. To the east are the buried
foundations of the chapter house, warming house, rere-dorter and covered drains which were all noted during partial excavation in 1966. To the south of this area, chalk footings of other medieval monastic buildings have also been noted, all within the area of the precinct.

The priory, originally built to house 16 nuns, was founded c.1148, when Mary, the daughter of King Stephen, became the first prioress. As an alien priory, St Mary's was originally dependent on St Sulpice, Rennes. This was the monastery from which Mary had come, bringing with her a number of the nuns. The priory, however, became independent at some time around 1227 when the King granted the priory a yearly fair at Michaelmas. The house was suppressed in
1521-2 when it was granted to St John's College, Cambridge. In 1965 a resistivity survey was undertaken in order to identify the position of any surviving foundations. The following year partial excavation of the site took place which revealed the plan of the medieval priory buildings. A stone coffin in the east alley of the cloister is the earliest datable
evidence from the site, while a late 13th century brass jetton was found embedded in the mortar of a covered drain. None of the buildings can be dated unequivocally to the period of the founding of the priory, but some appear to
have been built or possibly rebuilt in stone during the 13th century. Excluded from the scheduling are the occupied buildings, garden sheds, aviary, other outbuildings, gates, fences and fence posts, but the ground beneath all
these features is included.

ASSESSMENT OF IMPORTANCE
A nunnery was a settlement built to sustain a community of religious women. Its main buildings were constructed to provide facilities for worship, accommodation and subsistence. The main elements are the church and domestic
buildings arranged around a cloister. This central enclosure may be accompanied by an outer court and gatehouse, the whole bounded by a precinct wall, earthworks or moat. Outside the enclosure, fishponds, mills, field systems, stock enclosures and barns may occur. The earliest English nunneries were founded in the seventh century AD but most of these had fallen out of use by the ninth century. A small number of these were later refounded. The tenth
century witnessed the foundation of some new houses but the majority of medieval nunneries were established from the late 11th century onwards. Nunneries were established by most of the major religious orders of the time,
including the Benedictines, Cistercians, Augustinians, Franciscans and Dominicans. It is known from documentary sources that at least 153 nunneries existed in England, of which the precise locations of only around 100 sites
are known. Few sites have been examined in detail and as a rare and poorly understood medieval monument type all examples exhibiting survival of archaeological remains are worthy of protection.

St Mary's Priory survives comparatively well, with upstanding fragments of masonry as well as extensive below ground remains. Documentary sources, combined with the archaeological remains and environmental evidence demonstrated by partial excavation to be contained within the monument, provide an insight into the economy and way of life peculiar to a Benedictine priory.

Aerial photo assessment carried out by Historic England from 2009 - 2012 identified earthworks to the north of the complex that it interpreted as being related to the Abbey.(40)

<1> OS 6" 1939-40 (OS Card Reference). SKE48360.

<2> Md Rel Houses Eng & Wales 1953 213 (Knowles & Hadcock) (OS Card Reference). SKE46685.

<3> Tanner's `Notitia Monastica' 1787 Kent XXXIV (Naysmith) (OS Card Reference). SKE49802.

<4> Dugdale Mon Angl iv 381 (OS Card Reference). SKE41516.

<5> Chart II Hen III pt 2 m 17 (OS Card Reference). SKE38948.

<6> VCH Kent II 1926 145 (OS Card Reference). SKE51177.

<7> `Recs of Rochester Dirc' 138 (Fielding) (OS Card Reference). SKE32729.

<8> `Kentish Pilgrims Land' 1925 95 (WC Finch) (OS Card Reference). SKE32723.

<9> Rec 6" (RF Jessup) 1936 (OS Card Reference). SKE49077.

<10> `Hist of Kent' III 1797 482 (E Hasted) (OS Card Reference). SKE32716.

<11> The SE Naturalist & Ant 1954 Vol LIX 3-4 (FC Elliston-Erwood) (OS Card Reference). SKE50512.

<12> F1 CFW 23-JAN-59 (OS Card Reference). SKE42727.

<13> F2 EG 30-JUN-59 (OS Card Reference). SKE43311.

<14> F3 FGA 26-OCT-64 (OS Card Reference). SKE43396.

<15> Arch Cant 82 1967 143-61 plan (PJ Tester) (OS Card Reference). SKE35737.

<16> F4 ASP 25-NOV-69 (OS Card Reference). SKE43403.

<17> Arch Cant 80 1965 186-99 (AD Allen) (OS Card Reference). SKE35684.

<18> Arch Cant 81 1966 xlviii-xlix (PJ Tester) (OS Card Reference). SKE35734.

<19> Arch Cant 73 1959 207 (AF Allen) (OS Card Reference). SKE35532.

<20> Md Arch 11 1967 274 (DM Wilson and DG Hurst) (OS Card Reference). SKE46574.

<21> Md Rel Houses Eng and Wales 1971 259 (D Knowles and RN Hadcock) (OS Card Reference). SKE46693.

<22> Mons Threat or Dest, A Select List 1956-62 1963 44 (OS Card Reference). SKE47329.

<23> Field report for monument TQ 77 SW 8 - January, 1959 (Bibliographic reference). SKE4286.

<24> Field report for monument TQ 77 SW 8 - June, 1959 (Bibliographic reference). SKE4287.

<25> Field report for monument TQ 77 SW 8 - October, 1964 (Bibliographic reference). SKE4288.

<26> Field report for monument TQ 77 SW 8 - November, 1969 (Bibliographic reference). SKE4289.

<27> 1946, Photograph (Photograph (Print)). SWX9440.

<28> 1998, Photograph (Photograph (Print)). SWX10998.

<29> 1998, Photograph (Photograph (Print)). SWX10997.

<30> 1998, Photograph (Photograph (Print)). SWX10996.

<31> 1998, Photograph (Photograph (Print)). SWX10995.

<32> 1953, Photograph (Photograph (Print)). SWX10994.

<33> 1953, Photograph (Photograph (Print)). SWX10993.

<34> 1953, Photograph (Photograph (Print)). SWX10702.

<35> 1998, Photograph (Photograph (Print)). SWX10999.

<36> 1947, Photograph (Photograph (Print)). SWX9836.

<37> 1946, Photograph (Photograph (Print)). SWX9421.

<38> 1946, Photograph (Photograph (Print)). SWX9405.

<39> 1944, Photograph (Photograph (Print)). SWX10018.

<40> English Heritage, 2013, Hoo Peninsula, Kent. Hoo Peninsula Historic Landscape Project (Bibliographic reference). SKE31432.

Sources and further reading