It bothered me somewhat that although Claire Cross included the site at Kirkham on her map, s.p.b., I didn’t think it was in the East Riding. The confusion arises because that area has changed Ridings on the occasion of boundary changes. Kirkham is a significant site as it retains considerable standing ruins of the gatehouse building for the once abbey of Augustinian canons, see above from Wikipedia. In fact Claire uses John Sell Cotman’s painting of the ruined gatehouse (1805) as the cover illustration for her book. Kirkham sits in a gap in the Howardian Hills through which the River Derwent flows from the Vale of Pickering.
At this point it would be well to give a general (national) overview of monastic history so local information can be set in context.
In a small book published in 1958 by Her Majesty’s Stationary Office entitled ‘Abbeys, an Introduction to the Religious Houses of England and Wales’ (and still a good reference book) the author, R. Gilyard-Beer, states that the notion of monastic living, that is living in a community of devout Christians, naturally evolved from the aesthetic hermits of the first few centuries A.D. The monastic ideal came to England by two independent strands, one from Ireland, Wales and later Northumbria (especially with St. Columba’s foundation at Iona), the other from Rome with the mission of St. Augustine in 598 bringing the Benedictine Rule to England. It was at the famous Synod of Whitby, 663, that the official way forward was declared to be by the Benedictine Rule.
After the devastations of the Northmen invasions monastic life saw light again in the 10th century, and it was at this time that the first schism took place.
Like the story of the Christian Church in England generally, the landmarks in monastic history centred one break-away reformist movements. As Mr. Gilyard-Beer states ‘
(to be continued)