A Visit To Furness Abbey

The major part of what remains of Furness Abbey — A view of the main surviving portion of the large Furness Abbey complex. The tower of the main church is just out of the photograph to the left. (Wikimedia Commons)

We spent some time yesterday looking at the ruins of Furness Abbey, which, at the time of Henry VIII’s dissolution of the monasteries in the 1530s, was the second richest Cistercian institution in all of England, after an abbey in Yorkshire. The weather was perfect. Sunny, but not at all hot.

Furness Abbey, looking across the cloister — Another view of the complex, in a Wikimedia Commons photograph by Ian Taylor. Among the great things about ruins in England are the rich, manicured lawns that set them so elegantly off. Ruins in Italy, Greece, and the Middle East . . . umm, don’t usually have such lush lawns.

ruined abbey church transept — The transept of the Abbey’s main church (Wikimedia Commons)

The Abbey at Furness was established in the 1120s by Stephen, Count of Boulogne and Mortain, who would later become king of England.

In 2010, several burials were located on the site, including that of a distinguished person who might have been an abbot at Furness. With him were found the top of a bishop’s crozier (a symbolic shepherd’s staff signifying his rank) and a ring. These were the first such finds in Britain in the past fifty years. For a photograph of the two objects, which are now on display at the small Furness Abbey visitors center, see here:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-cumbria-26801800

We also drove out to have a look (from a lesser distance) at Piel Castle, which belonged to Furness Abbey:

Historic Piel Castle (or a-historic) — Piel Castle, just off the Furness Peninsula, is accessible by land only when the tide is out.
(Wikimedia Commons)

Posted from Brockwood Hall, Cumbria, England

A visit to Furness Abbey