Redlingfield Priory Explained

Redlingfield Priory was a medieval nunnery in Redlingfield, Suffolk, England. It was closed in the 1530s. The last prioress, Grace Samson, was awarded a pension, and the estate was given or sold to Sir Edmund Bedingfield.[1]

The priory was founded by Emma de Arras, Countess of Guisnes, a daughter of the Lord of Redlingfield, after the Norman Conquest in 1120.[2] There are some remains, including fish ponds and a building that is now a barn.[3] When the priory closed, its property included an antiphoner, a gradual, an organ in the quire of the priory chapel. There were six nuns, two priests, two shepherds or hinds, and four female servants.[4]

Some of the lead used to roof the priory was sold to Sir Anthony Denny, and Edmund Bedingfield disputed his rights to lead remaining at Redlingfield.[5] More lead from Redlingfield was acquired by Nicholas Bacon for his building projects.[6]

The parish church, which dates back to Anglo-Saxon times,[7] is thought to have been used by nuns.[8]

Notes and References

  1. Marilyn Oliva, The Convent and the Community in Late Medieval England: Female Monasteries in the Diocese of Norwich (Boydell, 1998), p. 196: Joan Thirsk, Chapters from the Agrarian History of England and Wales, 2 (Cambridge, 1990), p. 106.
  2. Vivien Brown, Eye Priory Cartulary and Charters, 2 (Boydell: Suffolk Record Society, 1994), p. 6.
  3. https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1005963?section=official-list-entry Redlingfield Nunnery and fish ponds, Historic England
  4. Mackenzie Walcott, 'Inventories of Religious Houses at the Dissolution', Archaeologia, 43 (1871), p. 245.
  5. John Caley, Henry Ellis, Bulkeley Bandinel, Monasticon Anglicanum, 4 (London, 1823), p. 25.
  6. Diarmaid MacCulloch, Letters from Redgrave Hall (Suffolk Record Society, Boydell, 2007), pp. 9-10.
  7. Web site: Village celebrates church grant . redlingfield.onesuffolk.net . dead . https://web.archive.org/web/20160307085415/http://redlingfield.onesuffolk.net/news/village-celebrates-church-grant/ . 2016-03-07.
  8. Web site: Knott. Simon. St Andrew, Redlingfield. 28 April 2014.

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