Leiston Abbey (first site) with later chapel and pill box

Heritage listing

Details The original site of Leiston Abbey, from which the community was removed in 1363 to a new site 3.37km to the south west, is located on a low island in the coastal marshes on the south side of Minsmere, 250m inland from the present shoreline. The monument includes the buried remains of the monastic church and conventual buildings, various ditched enclosures, and a large fishpond with associated water management features, set within a monastic precinct which is still defined in part by existing field boundaries. Also included are the ruins of a chapel on the site of the monastic church, and a World War II pill box camouflaged within the walls of the chapel. Leiston Abbey, dedicated to the Blessed Virgin, was founded for 26 regular canons of the Premonstratensian order in 1182 by Ranulph de Glanville, Chief Justiciary to King Henry II, and was endowed with the manor of Leiston and the churches of St Margaret, Leiston, and St Andrew Aldringham. Other endowments followed in the 13th and 14th centuries, and in the taxation roll of 1291, the annual value of the abbey is given as 130 pounds 15s 7d. The austerity and seclusion from the world sought by the Premonstratensian order are manifest in the original choice of location for the abbey, but the disadvantages and inconvenience of such an isolated and marshy site became increasingly apparent. In 1344, because of their impoverishment caused by frequent inundations by the sea, the abbey obtained a licence to acquire further lands and rents to the value of 20 pounds and, in 1363, a papal licence to remove to a new site at a more favourable location inland. The church and other buildings on the old site were demolished and the stone from them reused in the construction of the new, paid for by Robert de Ufford, Earl of Suff

From the Historic England List Entry under OGL v3.