The Chronicle of the Abbey of Evesham is a remarkable medieval history of one of England’s great Benedictine monasteries. Beginning with the abbey’s legendary and royal foundations, it traces the fortunes of Evesham through centuries of religious devotion, political conflict, legal struggle, rebuilding, reform, and royal patronage. At the heart of the chronicle is the abbey’s determination to defend its ancient liberties. Its monks record disputes with bishops, appeals to popes and papal legates, contested elections of abbots, lawsuits over lands and privileges, and the long struggle to preserve Evesham’s exemption from episcopal control. Alongside these institutional battles are vivid accounts of saints and miracles, including St Ecgwine, St Odulf and the royal martyr St Wistan, whose relics and cult formed an important part of the abbey’s identity. The chronicle also preserves a wealth of detail about everyday monastic life. It describes the building and repair of churches, cloisters, chapels, halls, mills, granges and fishponds; the acquisition of estates and revenues; the making of vestments, shrines, bells and liturgical books; and the provision of food, clothing, recreation and medical care for the monks. Successive abbots emerge not merely as religious superiors but as administrators, builders, patrons, diplomats and defenders of the community. Extending into the later Middle Ages, the narrative reflects the changing political world around Evesham, from the Norman Conquest and the Angevin kings to the Wars of the Roses and the reign of Henry VIII. The result is both a history of a single monastery and a richly detailed record of medieval English religious, legal, economic and political life. This edition offers modern readers direct access to one of the most important monastic chronicles of medieval England, revealing how the monks of Evesham understood their saints, their privileges, their rulers and their place in history.

Available at Amazon in eBook and Paperback format.

Our Ancient Monuments by Charles Kains-Jackson

Our Ancient Monuments by Charles Kains-Jackson is in Prehistory.

Our ancient monuments and the land around them. By Charles Philip Kains-Jackson; with a preface by Sir John Lubbock. 1880.

The Danes came from Northamptonshire, and they are reputed to have been told that should they come to see Hoarstone [Map] (seven miles S.S.E. of Rollrich) they would be lords of England. Hooknorton, the entrenched position of the Saxons, was stormed by the Danes. Hooknorton lies about midway between Rollrich and Bunbury. The Saxon defeat was very severe, but the battle seems to have checked the Danish advance. There is no proof that their army ever went to Rollrich. Why they should drag the bodies of the slain of Hooknorton five miles from the battle-field is difficult to say. One word more on Professor Fergusson, and we have done. The little legend of the Danes' wish to reach the mystic dolmen of Hoar, the Hoar-stone, is well known to local tradition. It bears the imprint of truth, itis too simple and unpretentious for invention. It embodies a most common idea of early warfare and invasion. It may fairly be admitted, and if admitted it shows a stone close to and precisely similar to those of Rollrich, to have been already old to tradition at the time when the Danes first penetrated into Oxfordshire.