Leiston Abbey

Around 1363 the abbey suffered so much from flooding that a new site was chosen and it was rebuilt further inland for its patron, Robert de Ufford, 1st Earl of Suffolk (1298-1369).

[9] In 1171 he founded the Priory of Augustinian canons at Butley, a few miles south of Leiston, on lands settled upon his wife by her father as a marriage endowment.

[11] Close ties existed between the two houses, and with the Augustinian nuns at Campsey Priory, a de Valoines foundation established shortly before 1195.

The site of the Leiston old abbey is identified with that of a ruined chapel at Minsmere, which stands near the sea on a marsh-girt island approached by a causeway from Eastbridge.

An extensive series of foundation charters exists,[19] including the confirmation by Archbishop Hubert Walter, Ranulf's nephew, of a Privilege of Pope Celestine III, granting, among many other rights, that of the free election of their abbot.

[34] In 1312 Gilbert Pecche, knight, granted lands at Hacheston, Glevering, Easton, Wickham Market, Pettaugh and Framsden to Leiston Abbey.

[35][36] De Ferre died in 1323 holding many manors: but only Benhall, which he held jointly with his wife Eleanor (as of the Honour of Eye), remained to her for her lifetime.

[43] It was in or shortly before 1380 that, having been withdrawn from the ravages of the sea, the entire newly built monastery apart from its church was destroyed by fire, together with their corn and other goods.

The Abbot and convent were obliged to petition for a writ of supersedeas for distraint of the tenth, being thrown completely into debt and deprived of subsistence, and were granted this relief.

[47] After escheat to the Crown, in 1385 the dignity and estates (including the advowson of Leiston Abbey) were bestowed upon Michael de la Pole, an intimate friend of King Richard II, who was accused of treason by the Lords Appellant in 1387 and fled into exile before February 1388.

[49] The plan of the ruins taken by Alfred Suckling in 1848 provides an outline of walls still surviving, which can be recognized in views made by Samuel and Nathaniel Buck (1738), Thomas Hearne (engraved 1781), Henry Davy and others.

Suckling's plan is described as "entirely inadequate" by Sir Alfred Clapham, whose studies of Premonstratensian architecture laid the basis of modern interpretation.

Externally the east wall and buttresses were embellished with flint flushwork in emergent Perpendicular style, while the offsets of stone tracery in the window-arches of the north transept and Lady chapel indicate curvilinear designs now lost.

The cloister wall on the east side shows the openings of the sacristy, the chapter house and (possibly) the infirmary, but the dormitory which ran above it and the body of the main structure is gone.

The full extent of the cloister south range is occupied by the walls of the Refectory, a high hall lit principally by a very tall west window, its arch still dominating that corner of the site.

The main external entrance to the cloister ran through this building, and in around 1500 a tall brick gatehouse with two octagonal turrets was added, one side of which still remains.

Excavations during the 1980s established the position of the lost south wall and turret of the brick entrance-gate structure, and explored the interior of the reredorter building.

Remote sensing was used to target thirteen small-scale excavation trenches: these were to locate and explore features indicated by geophysical anomalies or existing earthworks.

Low-level aerial photographic surveying, employing kite-mounted cameras and UAVs (drones), was carried out to assess structural evidence for buildings which may have formed an outer eastern range.