Lanercost Priory

Ken Rennie

Well-Known Member
I cycled here today, 6 mile round trip, to see if the water levels in the Quarry Beck were low enough for good photography (No) and whether the churchyard had any flowers out (Yes). This 12thC Augistinian Priory was once the seat of power in England when King Edward 1st stayed here for 5 months, with the entire court, while waiting to invade Scotland. It has been frequently attacked by the Scots, the border is about 10 miles North of here. Although most of the buildings are ruined the West end ( right hand as you look) is still used as the Parish Church. Ken
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AlanLichty

Moderator
This is seriously cool Ken. I wish we had something even half the age of this to explore on a local level in the Pacific NW. The cemetery looks quite interesting as well. Nice work with the flowers as a foreground to the Priory.
 

Ben Egbert

Forum Helper
Staff member
great images ken, love that second one with the flower foreground. English history is a sort of hobby for me, and I recall reading about Edward the 1st staying here, but it took your comment to jolt that memory back..
 

JimFox

Moderator
Staff member
Love these Ken! What a really cool Priory. I appreciate the history you added a lot, it adds a new dimension to seeing these. It's interesting that part of it is upkept and in use, and the other half is in ruins. What an interesting dichotomy.

Like Ben, the history of the UK is very interesting to me, and on my one visit there, I was soaking it up like a sponge. It was almost like a living history even though so much of it was in ruins since the ruins still stood. For us here, where often an ancient building might be 100 to 150 years old, it's amazing to see ruins and active buildings more then 1000 years old.
 

Ken Rennie

Well-Known Member
I should have added that some of the stones used to build the priory came from the nearby, less than 1 mile, Hadrian's Wall. The evidence 1, some of the stones have beautiful Latin inscriptions carved by skilled stone masons: 2, the wall completely disappears for several miles around the priory: 3, many of the courses of stones are exactly the same size as much of the wall. So 12th century priory with stones quarried in the 2nd C. I am aware of the history here but it comes home when I travel to France and Germany where the planning laws have stopped a great deal of urban development. In France, Belgium and Germany many towns have medieval centres although lots of the German ones were rebuilt after the 2nd world war and the Belgian ones after the first world war. The rebuilding used medieval building materials and must have cost a great deal. In Britain very few towns escaped being "modernised" in the 50's. The exceptions are beautiful but too many towns have horrible centres built badly with the cheapest materials designed by architects who were in a hurry. Ken
 
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