Stow Abbey
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The Minster Church of St Mary, Stow in Lindsey, is a major Anglo-Saxon church in Lincolnshire and is one of the largest and oldest parish church buildings in England. It has been claimed that the Minster originally served as the cathedral church of the
diocese of Lindsey The Bishop of Lindsey was a prelate who administered an Anglo-Saxon diocese between the 7th and 11th centuries. The episcopal title took its name after the ancient Kingdom of Lindsey. History The diocese of Lindsey (Lindine) was established whe ...
, founded in the 7th century and is sometimes referred to as the "Mother Church of Lincolnshire". It is partly Saxon and partly Norman in date and is designated by
English Heritage English Heritage (officially the English Heritage Trust) is a charity that manages over 400 historic monuments, buildings and places. These include prehistoric sites, a battlefield, medieval castles, Roman forts, historic industrial sites, Lis ...
as a Grade I listed building and was also included in the
World Monuments Fund World Monuments Fund (WMF) is a private, international, non-profit organization dedicated to the preservation of historic architecture and cultural heritage sites around the world through fieldwork, advocacy, grantmaking, education, and training ...
's 2006 list of the world's 100 most endangered sites. It has the tallest Saxon arches of its time in Britain, the earliest known example of Viking graffiti in England (a rough scratching of an oared Viking sailing ship, probably dating from the 10th century), an Early English font standing on nine supports with pagan symbols around its base and an early wall painting dedicated to St
Thomas Becket Thomas Becket (), also known as Saint Thomas of Canterbury, Thomas of London and later Thomas à Becket (21 December 1119 or 1120 – 29 December 1170), served as Lord Chancellor from 1155 to 1162, and then as Archbishop of Canterbury fr ...
. Today it is part of the Stow Group of Churches.


History

The bishop's
seat A seat is a place to sit. The term may encompass additional features, such as back, armrest, head restraint but may also refer to concentrations of power in a wider sense (i.e " seat (legal entity)"). See disambiguation. Types of seat The ...
at ''Sidnacester'' (Syddensis) has been placed, by various commentators, at
Caistor Caistor is a town and civil parish in the West Lindsey district of Lincolnshire, England. As its name implies, it was originally a Roman Empire, Roman castrum or fortress. It lies at the north-west edge of the Lincolnshire Wolds, on the Vikin ...
,
Louth Louth may refer to: Australia *Hundred of Louth, a cadastral unit in South Australia * Louth, New South Wales, a town * Louth Bay, a bay in South Australia ** Louth Bay, South Australia, a town and locality Canada * Louth, Ontario Ireland * Cou ...
,
Horncastle Horncastle is a market town and civil parish in the East Lindsey district in Lincolnshire, England. It is east of Lincoln. Its population was 6,815 at the 2011 census and estimated at 7,123 in 2019. A section of the ancient Roman walls rema ...
and, most often, at Stow, all in present-day
Lincolnshire Lincolnshire (), abbreviated ''Lincs'', is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in the East Midlands and Yorkshire and the Humber regions of England. It is bordered by the East Riding of Yorkshire across the Humber estuary to th ...
, England, but the location remains unknown. More recently
Lincoln Lincoln most commonly refers to: * Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865), the 16th president of the United States * Lincoln, England, cathedral city and county town of Lincolnshire, England * Lincoln, Nebraska, the capital of Nebraska, U.S. * Lincoln (na ...
has been suggested as a possible site. There had been a church in Stow even before the arrival of the Danes in 870, the year they are documented to have burnt the church down. The building remained in ruins until an abbey was built in 1040, reputedly by bishop
Eadnoth II Eadnoth II (or Eadnothus II) was a medieval Bishop of Dorchester, when the town was seat of the united dioceses of Lindsey and Dorchester. Eadnoth was consecrated in 1034 and died on 18 or 19 September 1049.Fryde, et al. ''Handbook of British C ...
.
Ralph de Diceto Ralph de Diceto or Ralph of Diss (; ) was archdeacon of Middlesex, dean of St Paul's Cathedral (from ), and the author of a major chronicle divided into two partsoften treated as separate worksthe (Latin for "Abbreviations of Chronicles") fro ...
attributes the church's foundation to Elnothus Lincolniensis, almost certainly Aelfnoth, Bishop of Dorchester, c. 975, who built the church, possibly on the site of an earlier wooden Saxon church, to serve as a minster (or mother church) for the Lincolnshire part of his large diocese. It was a second cathedral because part of the bishop's household of priests (which later became the cathedral chapter) lived in Stow and administered this part of the diocese. The memory of this period gave rise to the tradition that Stow is the Mother Church of
Lincoln Cathedral Lincoln Cathedral, also called Lincoln Minster, and formally the Cathedral Church of the Blessed Virgin Mary of Lincoln, is a Church of England cathedral in Lincoln, England, Lincoln, England. It is the seat of the bishop of Lincoln and is the Mo ...
. It is said to have been re-founded and re-endowed in 1054 by Leofric and
Godiva Lady Godiva (; died between 1066 and 1086), in Old English , was a late Anglo-Saxon noblewoman who is relatively well documented as the wife of Leofric, Earl of Mercia, and a patron of various churches and monasteries. She is mainly remembere ...
encouraged by
Wulfwig Wulfwig (Wulfinus) was a medieval Bishop of Dorchester, when the town was seat of the united dioceses of Lindsey and Dorchester. He was one of the last Anglo-Saxon bishops following the Norman Conquest. Life Wulfwig appears in a charter of 1045 ...
as a minster of secular canons with the bishop at its head. In 1091
Remigius of Fécamp Remigius may refer to: * Saint Remigius (c. 437–533), bishop of Reims; converted Clovis I, king of the Franks * Remigius of Rouen (755–771), archbishop of Rouen and illegitimate son of Charles Martel * (died 783), bishop of Strasbourg * Remigi ...
re-founded it as a
Benedictine The Benedictines, officially the Order of Saint Benedict (, abbreviated as O.S.B. or OSB), are a mainly contemplative monastic order of the Catholic Church for men and for women who follow the Rule of Saint Benedict. Initiated in 529, th ...
abbey - Stow Abbey - and brought monks to it from
Eynsham Abbey Eynsham Abbey was a Benedictine monastery in Eynsham, Oxfordshire, in England between 1005 and 1538. King Æthelred allowed Æthelmær the Stout to found the abbey in 1005. There is some evidence that the abbey was built on the site of an earlie ...
, describing the church as having been a long time deserted and ruined. Within five years his successor had transferred the monks back whence they had come and St Mary's had become a parish church.Victoria County History of Lincolnshire: Houses of Benedictine monks - the abbey of Stow
/ref> In 1865 J. L. Pearson built the stair turret outside the church. This was originally inside the church in the nave up against the north side of the tower arch. At the same time some windows were altered and the church was re-roofed. A new vestry was added in the early 1990s (some skeletons and a broken 13th-century limestone cross were found during the work). A mile to the west of the village and lying just to the south of the
Roman road Roman roads ( ; singular: ; meaning "Roman way") were physical infrastructure vital to the maintenance and development of the Roman state, built from about 300 BC through the expansion and consolidation of the Roman Republic and the Roman Em ...
from Lincoln to York, known as
Tillbridge Lane The A1500 is an A road entirely within the English county of Lincolnshire. It links the A156 at Marton with the A15 south of RAF Scampton via Sturton by Stow. The A1500 follows the Roman road Till Bridge Lane and at the very end at S ...
, are the remains of the medieval palace of the bishops of Lincoln built in 1336. All that can be seen today are the earthworks of the moat and to the north and east of the site the earthwork remains of its associated medieval fish-ponds.


Conservation issues

The church is a Grade I listed building, and is included in the 100 most endangered sites in the world by the
World Monuments Fund World Monuments Fund (WMF) is a private, international, non-profit organization dedicated to the preservation of historic architecture and cultural heritage sites around the world through fieldwork, advocacy, grantmaking, education, and training ...
in 2006. The site is also a
scheduled monument In the United Kingdom, a scheduled monument is a nationally important archaeological site or historic building, given protection against unauthorised change. The various pieces of legislation that legally protect heritage assets from damage, visu ...
, though the building itself is excluded from the schedule. The first stage of conservation needed is weatherproofing. Only then can internal decoration can be addressed. It is estimated that the work will take at least 10 years to complete and cost between £2 million and £3 million at current prices.


See also

*
List of ecclesiastical restorations and alterations by J. L. Pearson John Loughborough Pearson (1817–97) was an English architect whose works were mainly ecclesiastical. He was born in Brussels, Belgium, and spent his childhood in Durham, England, Durham. Pearson started his architectural training under Ignatiu ...


References


External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Stow-In-Lindsey, Minster 11th-century church buildings in England Church of England church buildings in Lincolnshire Grade I listed churches in Lincolnshire Standing Anglo-Saxon churches Scheduled monuments in Lincolnshire John Loughborough Pearson buildings