Tewkesbury Abbey; Or, How To Save Your Local Abbey

Tewkesbury Abbey is pretty much intact. Only the Lady Hall was removed from the abbey church. The townspeople bought the abbey from Henry VIII to be their parish church, for the price of the bell and the roof lead. And so they have what must be one of the largest and most beautiful parish churches on the island, virtually a model Norman cathedral. Which prompts us to wonder why this sort of thing wasn't done more often. Part of the answer must be that abbeys mostly were located in very remote places. No townspeople. Another part may be that the monastical system was on its last legs and deteriorating already. The plagues had thinned out the population sufficiently for there to be ample employment and opportunity elsewhere. Tintern Abbey, we read, was down to its last six monks, there were no lay brothers to work the fields or repair the buildings, and they were selling off their gold and silver just to eat. Based on aggrandizement, cheap labor, etc., they were not particularly well-liked, particularly as the Reformation was now gathering steam. So Henry VIII and his government merely administered the coup de grace; with a tidy profit, no doubt. The abbots and abbesses and their colleagues, we have been told, were pensioned off. Fortunately for us, Tewkesbury Abbey survived.

The Keep Calm thing, BTW, has gone way too far

The abbey church, from the campground car park

Aerial view, with town and mighty Avon in the background

Nave view; a bit of work going on...but you still can admire
the giant Norman piers, thevaulting, the triforium, the teeniny
windows in the clerestory, and so on

Thus; and the vaulting has bosses that relate events in the life
of Jesus

A Gurney stove, how large buildings were heated in the 19th
century; Tewkesbury has two

The Pelican myth (look it up)

Vicki observed: if you're going to do graffiti, do it well...

Chancel, altar, etc.

East window

Organ

In the Chapel of the Holy Trinity, the Chantry of Lord Hugh Despenser (one of
the Black Prince's lieutenants at Poitiers), the first example of true fan vaulting,
so the sign said; I'll be looking for the sign that announces the first example of
false fan vaulting

View from the northwest

The abbey sits on a beautiful park campus, Tewkesbury
center, studded with what must be champion trees (so
many there is a separate pamphlet on them); here, one
of a couple of big redwoods