- Folkestone Priory
Folkestone Priory was a pre-Reformation Benedictine
monastery atFolkestone in the English county ofKent . The priory church survives as the presentparish church . It was the successor to Folkestone Abbey, an Anglo-Saxonnunnery on a different site.First foundation
It was probably the first nunnery built in
England , having been traditionally founded in630 by SaintEanswith , the daughter of KingEadbald of Kent , who was the son of Saint Ethelbert, the first Christian king among the English. The abbey was dedicated toSaint Peter . Like many other similar foundations, it was destroyed by the Danes and the ruins subsequently fell into the sea.econd foundation
In
1095 , another monastery for Benedictine monks was erected on a different site by Nigel de Mundeville, Lord of Folkestone. This was an alien priory, a cell belong to the Abbey of Lonley or Lolley in Normandy, dedicated to St Mary and St Eanswith, whose relics were deposited in the church. As with its predecessor, the cliff on which the monastery was built was gradually undermined by the sea, and William de Abrincis, in1137 , gave the monks a new site, that of the present parish church of Folkestone.The conventual buildings were erected between the church and the sea coast. Being an alien priory it was occasionally seized by the king, when England was at war with
France , but after a time it was made denizen and independent of the mother-house inNormandy and thus escaped the fate which befell most of the alien priories in the reign of Henry V. It continued to the time of the dissolution and was surrendered to the king on15 November 1535 . The names of twelve priors are known, the last being Thomas Barrett or Bassett. The net income at the dissolution was about £50. It was bestowed by Henry VIII on Edmund, Lord Clinton and Saye.Remains
The only part of the original 1137 monastic buildings remaining is a Norman doorway, but the rest of the church was built for its later medieval monks and other foundations may be traced for a considerable distance.
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