Once I was a clever boy learning the arts of Oxford... is a quotation from the verses written by Bishop Richard Fleming (c.1385-1431) for his tomb in Lincoln Cathedral. Fleming, the founder of Lincoln College in Oxford, is the subject of my research for a D. Phil., and, like me, a son of the West Riding. I have remarked in the past that I have a deeply meaningful on-going relationship with a dead fifteenth century bishop... it was Fleming who, in effect, enabled me to come to Oxford and to learn its arts, and for that I am immensely grateful.


Saturday 15 May 2021

Our Lady of Abingdon


Today the virtual Marian Pilgrimage returns to the Thames valley and a visit to the abbey at Abingdon. I posted about this shrine last year in Our Lady of Abingdon

To that I will add three online accounts which describe something of the history and buildings of this Benefictine house. The first is the Victoria County History of Berkshire account of the abbey at Houses of Benedictine monks: The abbey of Abingdon

The second is by David Nash Ford from his always useful Royal Berkshire History site at RBH: History of Abingdon Abbey, Berkshire

The third is from stainedglassattitudes which has a survey of the wealth and sites of the twenty most affluent monastic houses at the time of their suppression. The section on Abingdon, at no 10, is useful for reproducing plans of excavations of the site and another plan of the abbey church based on William Worcester’s fifteenth century measurements and description and can be seen at MonasteryQuest™ Pt 1: the twenty richest houses at the dissolution


Our Lady of Abingdon Pray fir us


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