Exploring Kent's Past

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Monument details

Summary

The Abbot's Parlour, or Forensic Parlour, with a chapel above was built immediately south of and at the same time as the Abbot's Great Guest Hall during the abbacy of Abbot Thomas Fyndon in c. 1294-1300.

Monument Types

• CHAPEL (Medieval to Unknown - 1294 AD?)

Full description

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The Abbot's Parlour, or Forensic Parlour, with a chapel above was built immediately south of and at the same time as the Abbot's Great Guest Hall during the abbacy of Abbot Thomas Fyndon in c. 1294-1300. This building was situated directly to the north-west of the Great Cloister on the east side of the Great Court and adjoining the north side of the Abbot's Lodging.

It is a rectangular shaped building, constructed of flint in Early English style, built over an undercroft, which contained the parlour. The building measured about 50 feet in length E-W by about 26 feet in width N-S. An encaustic tiled pavement was found within the undercroft during excavations in 1845. The Forensic Parlour was a room set apart for conversation with visitors. It was situated below the Abbots Chapel, and must have been a rather dark room, for its only window was a small one, placed high up, which opened into the cloisters above the pentice roof. The parlour had communication with the cloister and also with the church, and both doorways are still there, though both are now blocked up.

Boggis, R. J. E. (Rev.), 1901, A History of St. Augustine's Monastery, Canterbury (Monograph). SKE30288.

John Newman, 1969, The Buildings of England: North East and East Kent (Monograph). SKE7874.

Roebuck, J., 2002, St. Augustine's Abbey, Canterbury (Monograph). SKE30293.

Sources and further reading