Whitland Abbey

Daughter monasteries

Cwmhir Abbey (1143/1176) Strata Florida Abbey ( 1164 ) Strata Marcella Abbey ( 1170 ) Comber Abbey ( 1200) Tracton Abbey ( 1225 )

Whitland Abbey ( Albalanda; Hendy - gwyn ) is a former Cistercian Abbey at Whitland in Carmarthenshire in Wales.

History

The monastery was founded in 1140 as a daughter house of Clairvaux Abbey Primary of the Norman Bishop Bernard of St David's in Little Trefgarn, 10 km north of Haverfordwest and moved to in 1151 after a donated by John of Torrington area in Whitland. It was the first Cistercian Abbey in Wales, mother monastery of nine other houses, the first of three in a short time and very rapid succession arose, and originally a Norman foundation. The abbey, however, soon came under the control of the Prince of Deheubarth, Lord Rhys, whose son died as a monk in Whitland, and took on a distinctly Welsh character. In the wars with England, the monastery took much damage. In the 15th century to the monastery, which had 17 Gran Gien, have counted 100 monks. The resolution already in 1536 the monastery escaped by paying a considerable sum of money. 1539 was nevertheless the dissolution of the monastery. Excavations were 1836 instead of 1920 and since 1990. Not far away is born in 1991 in Pembrokeshire Trappistinnenniederlassung the Holy Cross Abbey in Whitland.

Buildings and plant

From the monastery only small remnants remain. The cross-shaped, rectangular church was closed in the north of the plant, the retreat south. The western lay tract was separated by an alley from the monastery cloister, a not uncommon at daughter monasteries of Clairvaux appearance. However, the layout of the plant is relatively easy to recognize. Get the monastery Chronicle Cronica Wallia.