Abingdon

The early history of Abingdon abbey remains to this day as much of a mystery as it seems to have been in the early twelfth century, when members of the community attempted to create a past for themselves from whatever records and garbled traditions were at their disposal.  They claimed that a certain Cissa, king of the West Saxons, gave land at Abingdon to a nobleman called Hean (or Heaha), and to his sister Cille, for the foundation of a monastery; and they adduced charters to show how the abbey fared during the reigns of Cissa’s successors, Cædwalla and Ine (in the late seventh and early eighth centuries).  The monks had little of greater substance to report of the abbey’s history during the eighth and early ninth centuries, when the region seems generally to have been under the control of the Mercian kings; but assuming that the abbey still maintained its existence in the middle of the ninth century, it may then have had to endure the diversion of its estates to the purposes of the West Saxon regime.  There was doubtless a religious community of some kind at Abingdon in the first half of the tenth century, though much of the land in the vicinity had passed under royal control.  <Godescalc.>  In the early 950s the place was given by King Eadred to St Æthelwold, with its remaining endowment of 40 hides of land (Wulfstan, Vita S. Æthelwoldi, ch. 11); under Æthelwold (with assistance from King Eadred and King Edgar) its fortunes were transformed, and the abbey continued to prosper thereafter.

The Abingdon 'cartulary-chronicles'

The first attempt to produce a connected account of the abbey’s history, on the basis of the charters in its archives, took the form of an elaborate cartulary-chronicle, probably compiled in the second quarter of the twelfth century.  This work is preserved in BL Cotton Claudius C. ix, fols. 105-77 (Davis 3), written c. 1170, and has not been edited in its own right.  It begins with a series of charters, presented in a narrative framework, purporting to attest to the circumstances of the abbey’s foundation and endowment in the late seventh and early eighth centuries (S 1603, 241, 239, 252, 1179 and 93).  None is acceptable in its received form; but S 252 (in particular) suggests that the compiler had access to records pertaining to a monastery founded in the late seventh century by a certain Heaha, patricius, and Ceolswyth, and it possible, therefore, that he was adapting these records to suit his own purposes (cf. Stenton, Early History of Abingdon, pp. 9-18).  The compiler attempts thereafter to piece together an account of the abbey’s history in the ninth and early tenth centuries; but it is not until he reached the refoundation of the abbey during the reign of King Eadred that he seems sure of his ground.  The chronicle-cartulary as a whole contains about 75 purportedly pre-Conquest documents, all of which are related directly or indirectly to estates claimed by the abbey or known to have formed part of its endowment; the majority are royal diplomas, though it is apparent that the compiler had no particular aversion to other types of record, since he also included three writs and a will.  The diplomas cast directly in favour of the abbey show distinct signs of in-breeding (see Keynes, Diplomas, pp. 11-12, and nn. 15-17), perhaps suggesting that there had been occasion or need in the past to fabricate title-deeds for certain estates; on the other hand, most of the diplomas in favour of laymen and other individuals (listed ibid., p. 11, n. 13) appear to be authentic title-deeds transferred to the abbey when it acquired the estates to which they refer.

A second version of the Abingdon cartulary-chronicle, preserved in BL Cotton Claudius B. vi (Davis 4), itself written in the early thirteenth century, is the product of a thorough revision and amplification of the version in Claudius C. ix, probably undertaken towards the end of the twelfth century; see Chronicon Monasterii de Abingdon, ed. Stevenson.  The compiler of this revised version of the chronicle-cartulary produced an even more fanciful account of the early history of the abbey, which is not improved by the loss of two leaves at a crucial point in the narrative; see Stenton, Early History of Abingdon, pp. 2-4.  But it is important to emphasise that although Claudius B. vi may represent a later development of Abingdon’s conception of its past, it is nevertheless much more valuable as a cartulary than Claudius C. ix.  The compiler of the revised chronicle-cartulary was clearly determined to improve on his predecessor’s work, and did so by investigating the abbey’s muniments for himself: he provided full texts of the charters which had been consistently abbreviated in the earlier version of the work, and chose at the same time to incorporate copies of about 70 additional charters which had previously been left aside.  It is a tribute to the thoroughness of his predecessor (and perhaps to his own restraint) that the reviser was not able to find any more diplomas directly in favour of the abbey; but he includes about 40 diplomas in favour of laymen for estates which had already been covered in some form or other in the earlier work (constituting a ‘second’ series of Abingdon charters, listed in Keynes, Diplomas, p. 12, n. 18), and about 30 other diplomas, also in favour of laymen, for estates which have no known connection with the abbey (constituting a ‘third’ series, listed ibid. p. 12, n. 19).  The compiler of the revised version of the chronicle-cartulary appears to have assumed that the beneficiaries of the diplomas in the ‘third’ series gave the estates in question to the abbey; and while it may be true that the abbey did have an interest of a kind in some of the estates, it is conceivable that several of the diplomas had in fact been deposited in the abbey’s archives by their owners for safe-keeping, and not subsequently recovered. 

A fourteenth-century cartulary of the abbey (Oxford, Bodleian Library, Lyell 15 (Davis 5)) contains a Latin text of S 1065; another fourteenth-century cartulary (Chatsworth House, MS. 71 E (Davis 6)), contains a text of S 184 (a charter of Cenwulf, king of Mercia, which featured in the trial of Humfrey Stafford for high treason, in 1485).  For these cartularies, see Two Cartularies of Abingdon Abbey, ed. Slade and Lambrick.  It should otherwise be noted that a single-sheet version of S 886 was ‘created’ in the thirteenth century from the text entered in Claudius B. vi, presumably for use in legal proceedings.

<Destruction of the archives in 1327 (Salter, ‘A Chronicle Roll’).> 

Other records

Obits added in the margins of a martyrology written in the late tenth or early eleventh century (Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, MS. 57 (Ker, Catalogue, no. 34)) throw some light on the community of Abingdon abbey in the tenth and eleventh centuries, and on those whom it considered to be its friends; for further discussion, see Keynes, Diplomas, p. 239, n. 22, and Gerchow, Gedenküberlieferung, pp. 245-52 and 335-8 (no. 18).  A form for the general announcement of the death of a member of the Abingdon community, and an example of a letter addressed to Abbot Æthelstan (1044-7) announcing the death of a member of another community, were added after the end of the martyrology (94v). 

A list of members of the community of Abingdon abbey (c. 954-c. 1030) is entered in the ‘Liber Vitae’ of the New Minster, Winchester.

The Dissolution of Abingdon Abbey

The abbey was one of the first major houses to surrender (9 February 1538).  Little appears to be known of the fate of the abbey’s muniments; but clear that at least twenty Anglo-Saxon charters had survived in their ‘original’ form, and were dispersed in the later sixteenth century.  One group of twelve single-sheet AS charters passed into the hands of King Henry VIII’s physician, Dr George Owen, doubtless in connection with his acquisition of monastic properties in the 1540s (above, pp. 00-0).  These charters were transcribed when in Owen’s possession by Robert Talbot (Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, MS. 111, pp. 139-78, whence copied by Joscelyn in BL Cotton Vitellius D. vii, 19rv + 23r-26v + 31r-36r); but the charters themselves are now lost.  Another group of eight single-sheet AS charters had a different history, and passed conceivably into the possession of Powell/Allen.  These charters were seen by the Oxford antiquary Brian Twyne (above, p. 000), and excerpts from them were made by Cotton’s librarian, Richard James (Oxford, Bodleian Library, James 21, pp. 154-68); the charters themselves passed soon afterwards in the Cotton collection, and were incorporated (en bloc) into the Augustus portfolio (above, p. 000).  Of the two principal cartularies, only Claudius B. vi has a history before its acquisition by Sir Robert Cotton.  It belonged in the late sixteenth century to Sir Thomas Parry (d. 1616), and was known at that time as the Abingdon ‘Lande Booke’ (above, p. 000); it is next reported in the possession of Thomas Erskine, Viscount Fenton (1566-1639), and seems to have passed from him into the hands of a Mr Powell of Sandford, from whom it was acquired by Thomas Allen (above, p. 000), before finally settling in the Cotton library.

<Mon Angl. i. 266: B. vi cited as formerly Fenton’s.  Note in CCCOxon MS. 255, 61r (Twyne’s notes from Claud. B. vi): ‘Liber Dni. de Fenton, et mutuo accepit pro me Mr. Tho. Allen a magistro Powell de Sandford’.  For a later John Powell of Sandford, cf. Davis 874; Sandford Cartulary, p. vi-vii.  Perhaps the Twyne-James-Cotton group of Abingdon single sheets had also belonged to Allen; not entirely clear whether James copied transcripts by Twyne, or the originals.>

Charters of Abingdon

Edition: Charters of Abingdon Abbey, ed. S. E. Kelly, 2 vols. (Oxford, 2000-1); Historia Ecclesie Abbendonensis / The History of the Church of Abingdon, ed. John Hudson, 2 vols. (Oxford, 2002 [vol. 2] and 2007 [vol. 1])

Royal diplomas.  93; 166; 183; (184); 202; 225; 239; 241; 252; 268; 269; 278; 302; 335; 355; 369; 396; 404; 408; 409; 410; 411; 413; 448; 460; 461; 471; 480; 482; 491; 494; 496; 500; 525; 529; 539; 542; 544; 552; 558; 559; 560; 561; 564; 567; 577; 578; 581; 583; 584; 587; 588; 590; 591; 594; 597; 603; 605; 607; 611; 614; 615; 617; 618; 620; 621; 622; 624; 634; 639; 650; 651; 654; 657; 658; 663; 665; 673; 678; 682; 687; 688; 689; 690; 691; 698; 700; 701; 705; 708; 713; 714; 722; 724; 725; 732; 733; 734; 737; 750; 756; 757; 758; 759; 760; 761; 769; 778; 828; 829; 833; 839; 843; 851; 852; 855; 858; 876; 883; 886; 887; 896; 897; 901; 902; 915; 918; 927; 934; 937; 964; 967; 973; 993; 999; 1020; 1022; 1023; 1025; 1201; 1603; 1604.  Of these, the following were transcribed by Robert Talbot from single sheets in the possession of Dr George Owen (now lost): 404; 411; 544; 558; 559; 584; 605; 611; 615; 758; 886; 896.  (Copies of 544, 584 and 615 were not entered in the chronicle-cartularies.)

Writs.  1065; 1066; 1404.  See also 1866.

Miscellaneous.  1179; 1208; 1216; 1271; 1292.

Will.  1488.

Boundary clauses.  The thirteenth quire of BL Cotton Claudius C. ix consists of eight leaves (fols. 195-202), of which the first was left blank; an older foliation ([i], 1-7) suggests that this quire may once have had a separate existence.  It contains a collection of about sixty boundary clauses, written by the scribe also responsible for the main part of the cartulary-chronicle.  The majority of the bounds correspond to those which occur in charters included in Claudius C. ix and Claudius B. vi, or in Claudius B. vi alone.  In a few cases, however, the bounds appear to have no corresponding charter in either version of the cartulary-chronicle.  As listed by Sawyer, the ‘unattached’ bounds are: 1540; 1542 (cf. 411); 1543 (cf. 673); 1544 (cf. 828-9); 1545 (cf. 1201); 1546 (cf. 409); 1567 (cf. 460); 1569; 1574.  The relationship between the collection of bounds in Claudius C. ix, and the charters in the chronicle-cartulary, would repay further investigation.  Many of the boundary clauses in question are discussed by Gelling, Place-Names of Berkshire III, pp. 615-794.  <Also S 1216, etc.>

Select bibliography

WM, GP, pp. 191-3; Mon Angl. i. 97-108; Not. Mon. (Berkshire), no. I; Mon. Angl. (rev. ed.) i. 505-30; VCH Berks. ii. 51-62; MRH, p. 58; HRH, pp. 23-4.

• M. Biddle, G. M. Lambrick and J. N. L. Myres, ‘The Early History of Abingdon and its Abbey’, Medieval Archaeology 12 (1968), pp. 26-69; 
• Edwards, Charters of the Early West Saxon Kingdom, pp. 165-96;
• M. Gelling, The Place-Names of Berkshire III, EPNS 51 (Cambridge, 1976);
• Harmer, Writs, pp. 122-33;
• H. E. Salter, ‘A Chronicle Roll of the Abbots of Abingdon’, EHR 26 (1911), pp. 727-38;
• C. F. Slade and G. Lambrick, ed., Two Cartularies of Abingdon Abbey, 2 vols., Oxford Historical Soc. ns 32-3 (Oxford, 1990);
• F. M. Stenton, The Early History of the Abbey of Abingdon (Reading, 1913);
• J. Stevenson, ed., Chronicon Monasterii de Abingdon, 2 vols., Rolls ser. (London, 1858);
• A. Thacker, ‘Æthelwold and Abingdon’, Bishop Æthelwold: his Career and Influence, ed. B. Yorke (Woodbridge, 1988), pp. 43-64.
• Liber Vitae, ed. Keynes, pp. 95-6.
• The Abingdon Chronicle, A. D. 956–1066 (MS. C, with reference to BDE), ed. P. W. Conner, The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle: a Collaborative Edition 10 (Cambridge, 1996)
• J. Hudson, paper on chronicle-cartulary, in Anglo-Norman Studies 19 (1997)

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October 2011