A carved female head wearing a crown that has been discovered at the site of Bradwell Abbey, whose site is now within the conurbation that is Milton Keynes, has been identified as being Queen Eleanor of Aquitaine. Although now referred to as an abbey the house was in fact a priory and was founded around 1154, the year that Queen Eleanor’s husband King Henry II succeeded to the throne. The small but notably strict house of Benedictine monks was one of those suppressed in 1524 and its endowments transferred to his colleges in Ipswich and Oxford by Cardinal Wolsey.
The illustrated report about the discovery of the carving can be seen at 12th century carving of Eleanor of Aquitaine discovered in an article from Medievalists.net
The same site had a piece sbout one of the surviving fragments of the buildings, the free standing and still roofed chapel of St Mary and its painted decoration in Repairs needed at medieval chapel in Bradwell Abbey
Wikipedia has a brief account of the history and the site at Bradwell Abbey
The second volume of the Victoria County History of Buckinghamshire has a much more detailed account of what is known of the history of the monastic community and it can be viewed at Houses of Benedictine monks: The priory of Bradwell
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