Mount Grace Priory

House of Mount Grace of Ingelby

Mount Grace Priory
Monastery information
Order Carthusian
Established 1398
Disestablished 1539
Dedicated to House of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin and of St Nicholas
Diocese York
People
Founder(s) Thomas de Holand, Earl of Kent and Duke of Surrey
Site
Location East Harlsey, North Yorkshire, England
Coordinates 54°22′48″N 1°18′40″W / 54.380120°N 1.311077°W / 54.380120; -1.311077Coordinates: 54°22′48″N 1°18′40″W / 54.380120°N 1.311077°W / 54.380120; -1.311077
Grid reference SE449985
Visible remains church, cloister, inner court and earthworks
Public access yes (English Heritage)

Mount Grace Priory, in the parish of East Harlsey, North Yorkshire, England, within the North York Moors National Park, is today the best preserved and most accessible of the ten medieval Carthusian houses (charterhouses) in England.[1] Set in woodlands, it was founded in 1398 by Thomas Holland, 1st Duke of Surrey,[2] the son of King Richard II's half-brother Thomas, Earl of Kent, it was the last monastery established in Yorkshire, and one of the few founded anywhere in Britain in the period between the Black Death (1349–50) and the Reformation. It was a fairly small establishment, with space for a prior and twenty-three monks.[2]

Mount Grace Priory consisted of a church and two cloisters. The northern cloister had sixteen cells whilst the southern had five cells, Frater and Prior's house and the Chapter House. To the west stood the lay brothers' quarters and the guest house.[2]

Upon the abdication of King Richard, Holland and others of the king's supporters attempted to assassinate his recently crowned successor, Henry IV, at New Year's, 1400, but were captured and executed. Holland's body was eventually recovered and, in 1412, re-buried in the charterhouse that he had founded. The orphaned priory of Mount Grace, bereft of its founder and the income that had been granted to it by Holland and King Richard, depended upon royal largesse for its income for more than a decade.

Carthusian Priory

On its founding, Thomas Holland ordered that the monks were to pray for the king, queen and several members of the royal family, and for himself and his heirs, and many others including John and Eleanor Ingelby. The prior of the Grande Chartreuse allowed him to nominate Robert Tredwye as the first rector (although the charter[3] refers to him as the first prior) and to dedicate the priory to "the Blessed Virgin and Saint Nicholas". The second part of the dedication lapsed and the priory became known as the House of the Assumption of the most Blessed Virgin in Mount Grace.[4] Nicholas Love, prior of Mount Grace, succeeded in creating a link between the priory and the Lancastrian administration, in part by submitting his "Mirror of the Blessed Life of Jesus Christ" to Thomas Arundel, archbishop of Canterbury, Henry IV's chancellor, in support of the archbishop's campaign against Wycliffism, and by granting Arundel confraternity in the spiritual benefits of Mount Grace in exchange for his provision of material benefits. In 1410 the house was formally incorporated into the order, and Love named as fourth rector and first prior.[5] (But note the disparity with the original charter.[3])

Panorama of Mount Grace Priory remains, from the south west

The house received a number of grants and charters :

In 1439 the Priory asked parliament to confirm their title – the number of claimants to the estate meant that they dared not continue to build – and Henry VI did so in 1440. Following this, the gifts and income continued :

Writings

Mount Grace became an important locus for the production and preservation of contemplative and devotional texts: among writers professed as monks there were John Norton and Richard Methley (the latter known for his Latin translations of "The Cloud of Unknowing" and of the anonymous English translation of Marguerite Porete's "Mirror of Simple Souls"). The only surviving manuscript of "The Book of Margery Kempe" also belonged to Mount Grace Charterhouse.

Dissolution

The priory was closed in 1539 during the dissolution of the monasteries by King Henry VIII. Some of the monks had (in 1534) attempted to avoid taking the oath of supremacy but, after they were imprisoned, the last prior, John Wilson, handed the keys over to Henry VIII's representatives. The site then passed into private ownership.[2]

Mount Grace was valued at £382 5s. 11½d. gross (£323 2s. 10½d. net) which included £104 6s. 8d. from spiritualities in Lincolnshire, £164 from lands outside Yorkshire and the rest from its home county of Yorkshire. In December 1539 the brothers were awarded pensions totalling £195 – £60 plus the house and chapel called the Mount for the prior, £7 for each of eight priests and small sums for eighteen.[4]

Daily life

Unlike monks of other orders, who live in common, the Carthusians—to this day—live as hermits, each occupying his own cell (more like a small house), and coming together only for the nocturnal liturgical hours, and on Sundays and feast-days, in the chapel; the other hours are sung by each monk separately in his cell. Except for the singing of the liturgy and conversation "on grave subjects" during a weekly three-hour exercise walk, Carthusians are silent, and their diet is strictly vegetarian.

The monks at Mount Grace were very conscious of hygiene and sanitation; included in the reconstructed cell is a reconstructed latrine and visitors are able to investigate the ditches used as sewage systems.

Post Dissolution

After the dissolution, the ruins of the guest-house of the priory were incorporated into two later houses: a seventeenth-century manor—a rare building of the Commonwealth period— built by Thomas Lascelles[7] and the larger house of 1900–01, an important example of the Arts and Crafts movement.[7] The Manor House at the priory was decorated in Arts and Crafts style under the ownership of the ironmaster Sir Isaac Lowthian Bell.[8]

Present day

The property is now owned by the National Trust but under the care of English Heritage.[1]

Visitors today can see the layout of the whole monastery, including one reconstructed monk's cell, together with the typically small Carthusian chapel and the later house. There is also a museum on the site detailing the history of the priory.

English Heritage currently let the Prior's Lodge as a holiday cottage.[1]

Priors and rectors of Mount Grace

The Houses of Carthusian monks: Priory of Mount Grace[4] lists a number of the priors of the house, together with the years they are known to have held office. It might not be correct, as the first two entries could be rectors not priors; nor is it complete as (for example) Carthusian records show Nicholas Love or Luff to be the first prior and fourth rector.[5] The list is:

  1. Robert Tredwye or Tredewy, 1398
  2. Edmund, occurs 1399
  3. Nicholas Luff, occurs 1413, 1415, 1416 (Period of office ends in 1417 according to other sources.[9])
  4. Robert Layton, occurs 1421
  5. Thomas Lockington – Prior from 1421 to 1447 (given in "The typescript List of Obiits of the Carthusians of the English Houses")[9] ("The Houses of Carthusian Monks..." shows "Thomas, occurs 1428" and "Thomas Lockington, occurs 1436, 1437, 1439" as separate entries.)
  6. Robert, occurs 1449, 1454
  7. Robert Leke, occurs 1469, 1473
  8. Thomas, occurs 1475, 1476
  9. Thomas, occurs 1497
  10. Henry Eccleston, occurs 1501, 1506
  11. John, occurs 1527-8, 1531–2
  12. William (?) Fletcher, occurs 1532-3
  13. John Wilson, occurs 1537-8

References

  1. 1 2 3 English Heritage website Date accessed: 29 December 2010.
  2. 1 2 3 4 Moors Knowledge website Date accessed: 29 December 2010.
  3. 1 2 Manuscript in 'Ingilby Records' Date accessed: 29 December 2010.
  4. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 'Houses of Carthusian monks: Priory of Mount Grace', A History of the County of York: Volume 3 (1974), pp. 192–193. Date accessed: 29 December 2010.
  5. 1 2 THE ARCHIVE OF BERMONDSEY ABBEY Date accessed: 29 December 2010.
  6. ↑ The Heads of Religious Houses: England and Wales, III. 1377–1540 By David M. Smith Date accessed: 29 December 2010.
  7. 1 2 BBC News Date accessed: 29 December 2010.
  8. ↑ "Arts and crafts revival planned at Mount Grace". English Heritage. 14 January 2010. Retrieved 28 November 2012.
  9. 1 2 Note 8 to "The typescript List of Obiits of the Carthusians of the English Houses" Accessed 30 December 2010

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