Godstow
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Godstow (Oxfordshire, England) is to the west of the River Thames opposite Lower Wolvercote north of Port Meadow at Oxford in England. It is now mainly known for the ruined Godstow Abbey (also known as Godstow Nunnery).
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[edit] The Abbey
Godstow abbey was built on what was then an island between streams running into the River Thames. The site was given to the foundress Edith, widow of Sir William Launceline in 1133 by John of St. John and built in local limestone in honour of St Mary and St John the Baptist for nuns of the Benedictine Order; with a further gift of land from him, the site was later enlarged. The church was consecrated in 1139.
The abbey was again enlarged between 1176 and 1188 when Henry II gave the establishment:
- £258 - which included £100 for the church,
- 40,000 shingles,
- 4,000 laths, and
- Much timber.
This endowment is no doubt due to the site being the burial place of his mistress Rosamund Clifford.
The abbey was suppressed in 1539 under the Second Act of Dissolution.
The Abbey precincts were entered from the Wolvercote-Wytham road, which ran through the outer court. Here there was a two-storey main gatehouse which had one large gate for carts and a second smaller one beside it for foot traffic.
The site consisted of:
- An outer court containing a range of buildings.
- St. Thomas's chapel which appears to have been used a church by the Abbey's servants
- Lodging for a priest.
- A guest house.
- A Nunnery.
- The Abbey church which contained cloisters along with associated buildings
[edit] Rosamund Clifford: the "Fair Rosamund"
The abbey became the final burial place of the famed beauty Rosamund Clifford (died circa 1176), a long-term mistress of Henry II. Henry's liaison with Rosamund became public knowledge in 1174; it ended when she retired to the nunnery at Godstow in 1176, shortly before her death.
Henry and the Clifford family paid for her tomb at Godstow in the choir of the convent's church and an endowment for it to be tended by the nuns. It became a popular local shrine until 1191, two years after Henry's death. Hugh of Lincoln, Bishop of Lincoln, while visiting Godstow, noticed Rosamund's tomb right in front of the high altar. The tomb was laden with flowers and candles, demonstrating that the local people were still praying there. Calling Rosamund a harlot, the bishop ordered her remains removed from the church. This was part of the long-term campaign by the Roman Catholic Church to eradicate earlier Norse and Anglo-Saxon traditions of marriage amongst the nobility. Her tomb was moved outside of the abbey church itself to the cemetery at the nuns' chapter house next to it, where it could still be visited until it was destroyed in the Dissolution of the Monasteries under Henry VIII of England.
[edit] The Abbey after the dissolution
The abbey was converted into Godstow House by George Owen. It was occupied by his family until 1645, when the building was badly damaged in the Civil War. After this damage, the building fell into disrepair and was used by the locals as a source of stone for their buildings.
During the 19th and 20th centuries, the ruined abbey was used for collecting livestock during the annual rounding up of animals on Port Meadow.
In Victorian times, Charles Dodgson (aka Lewis Carroll) brought Alice Liddell (aka Alice in Wonderland) and her sisters, Edith and Lorina, for river trips and picnics at Godstow.
Also alongside the Thames at Lower Wolvercote and Godstow is The Trout Inn, a well-known public house, close to Godstow Bridge. The bridge, in two spans, was built in 1792, the southern span being rebuilt in 1892.
[edit] References
- 'Wolvercote: Site and remains of Godstow abbey', A History of the County of Oxford: Volume 12: Wootton Hundred (South) including Woodstock (1990), pp. 311–13. URL: http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.asp?compid=1485. Date accessed: 11 January 2006.
- Royal Commission on Historical Monuments, City of Oxford. HMSO 1939.
