Reading Abbey today
A Picturesque Ruin
The Chapter House as it appears today - closely hemmed in by modern office buildings.
Reading Abbey closed in 1539. Books, treasures, relics, furniture and fittings were all dispersed or destroyed, and many of the buildings have been pulled down and the materials reused elsewhere. Today remains and reminders of the Abbey can be seen in the modern townscape.
When the Abbey came to an end, the monks were provided with a lump sum or a small pension and turned away to make a new life in the outside world as best they could. Stones and rafters from the Abbey Church were used in the rebuilding of St Mary's Church, and bridges, roads and houses in and around Reading were constructed with stones from the Abbey. Wooden panelling in Magdalen College, Oxford, is said to come from Reading. In the abandoned gardens of the monastery and amongst the ruins, trenches were dug for the underlying gravel in the 30 acres of land where once the Abbey stood. For three hundred years the decay and loss continued. Early maps show less and less of the monastery buildings still in existence.
The Abbey Ruins were an appealing subject for artists and in their pictures the slow collapse and demolition of walls and arches can be traced. Similarly, antiquarians wrote of what they could see remaining but no effort was made for its long term preservation. We can only guess at what documents and moveable objects from the Abbey existed during these years but have rotted or were thrown away.
Encroachment and Restoration
By contrast there is today an ardent concern to discover and understand more about the Abbey and to maintain what is left for future generations. The change in attitude can be traced back to the last century with the purchase of the Forbury and the Abbey Ruins by Reading Corporation starting in the 1830s and the laying out of municipal gardens among them. The building of St James's Church in 1840 to the north of the site of the Abbey Church re-established a link with the worship of the monks and their prime relic, the Hand of St James.
Original buildings such as the Hospitium and Inner Gateway were restored by the Corporation rather than demolished. The interest led to extensive diggings among the ruins in the middle of the last century to provide occupation for the unemployed and to discover the layout of foundations and interesting objects. Sadly, compared to what is expected of archaeological excavation today, these investigations were well below acceptable standards; little was recorded of the discoveries, nothing was kept and it would have been better if they had never happened.
Twentieth Century Research
In 1901 the first book on the Abbey was published, written by Dr Jamieson Hurry. His interest inspired the commissioning of paintings of important events in the history of the monastery and the erection of a memorial to Henry I in the Forbury Gardens. Work was periodically carried out on the Abbey Ruins to restore their stability and to prevent further deterioration and they were given the legal protection of being scheduled as an ancient monument in 1915. Around the time of the 800th anniversary of the Abbey there was much local interest with a pageant on the story of Reading and the issuing of many commemorative medallions with the design based on the Abbey seal.
Dr Hurry's work has been carried further by staff at Reading University starting in the 1960s. Dr Slade excavated in the Cloister area, the east end of the Church, the Mill and the Stables, and Dr Kemp worked on manuscripts from the Abbey. The Trust for Wessex Archaeology continued excavations, revealing more of the Cloister and Stables, the wooden structures of the Abbey Wharf and the layout of the perimeter wall. Funding for excavation work has come most generously from grants from central government, Reading Borough Council, Berkshire County Council and developers and private industry. In contrast to the Victorian digging these excavations have been carried out with meticulous recording, drawing and photography of the successive layers uncovered and removed as investigation progressed, each peeled away as if reading the pages of a book. And all the objects found were plotted, marked and bagged to be kept for future study: pottery fragments, oyster shells, animal bones, coins, window glass.
Reading Abbey today ... and tomorrow
Today, the Abbey Ruins are looked after by Reading Borough Council. Objects from excavations are displayed in the Museum's Reading : People & Place Gallery and in the Window Gallery. Our understanding and knowledge of the Abbey increases as research and new discoveries are made. For example in 1997 archaeologists working on the site of The Oracle discovered a carved stone corbel that had been reused in the seventeenth century Yield Hall.
One of the lasting effects of the Abbey on people is Reading's road system. The Forbury Road still takes traffic round the north and east edge of the Abbey site. By St Laurence's Church the road uses the site of the West Gate and the entrance to Abbey Square by the Central Library on Kings Road is the position of the South Gate. The traffic flows around the periphery of the site as it did during the time of the Abbey. The Forbury Gardens and the Abbey Ruins retains the tranquility it possessed when the monks lived there.
In 1984 the Friends of Reading Abbey were formed to support the conservation of the ruins. The following year the Mayor of Reading, Janet Bond, launched a successful fundraising appeal. In 2003 Reading Borough Council was awarded a grant from the Heritage Lottery Fund to restore the Victorian character of the Forbury Gardens.
The ruins are curently closed as further work is underway to secure their long term preservation.
But puzzles and mystery will always remain, in particular was Henry I's coffin opened and his skeleton scattered? Or do his remains still lie beneath the ground here in Reading?
Date updated: 07 Nov 2011
Related Websites:
Reading Abbey history podcast |
http://youtu.be/54neMsRDurM |
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