TINTERN ABBEY, MONMOUTHSHIRE. THIS highly-beautiful and interesting ruin, the delight and admiration of strangers from every part of the kingdom, is situated in the upper division of the hundred of Ragland, about ten miles distant from Monmouth and five from Chepstow. The Abbey was for monks of the Cistertian order, and founded in the year 1131, by Walter de Clare, who dedicated it to the Virgin Mary. This Walter was the grandson of William the son of Osbert, to whom William the Conqueror had given the manors of Wollesten and Tudenham, and all he could conquer from the Welsh. Walter, dying without issue, was succeeded by his brother, Gilbert Strongbowe, earl of Pembroke, whose grandson, Robert Strongbowe, was the conqueror of Leinster, in Ireland. The male line failing, Maud, the eldest of their female heirs, was married to Hugh Bigod, earl of Norfolk and Suffolk. William, lord marshal of England, and earl of Pembroke, in the seventh year of the reign of king Henry III. confirmed to the monks all the lands, possessions, liberties, and immunities, formerly granted by his predecessors. Roger Bigod, earl of Norfolk, in the TINTERN ABBEY. year 1301, also confirmed to them divers lands at Portcassek, Pentick, Modisgat, &c. About the time of the dissolution the number of inmates were only thirteen, when the estates were, according to Dugdale, estimated at £192: 1: 4 per annum. Speed says, the value was £252: 11: 6. The scite was granted the 28th of Henry VIII. to Henry, earl of Worcester, and is now the property of the duke of Beaufort. In the ruins of Tintern Abbey, the original construction of the church is perfectly marked; and it is principally from this circumstance that they are celebrated as a subject of curiosity and contemplation.— From Tintern village, in walking to the Abbey, you pass the works of an iron-foundry, and a train of miserable cottages, completely ingrafted on the ruins of the Abbey. This disagreeable and confined approach is not calculated to inspire any spectator with a very high estimation of what he is about to view; but on throwing open the west door of the church, an effect bursts on the spectator of so majestic and singular description, that words cannot do justice to its merit, nor convey an adequate idea of the scene. It is neither a mere creation of art nor an exhibition of nature's charms, but a grand spectacle, in which both seem to have blended their powers in producing an object beautiful and sublime. The walls are almost entire; the roof only is fallen |