Monkton Farleigh Priory
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Bradford on Avon, Wiltshire
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The Monks’ Conduit
A monastery of Cluniac monks dedicated to St Mary Magdalene was founded at Farleigh in about 1125 by Humphrey de Bohun II, who died in 1131. He endowed it with his manor of Farleigh and most of it was confirmed by his son Humphrey III. It was daughter foundation of the monastery of St Pancras at Lewes in Sussex.
Besides the manor, the monastery owned land at Monkton in Broughton Gifford, at Monkton in Chippenham, Foxhangers Wood in Rowde, in Cumberwell, South Wraxall and elsewhere, including some property in the St Margaret’s area of Bradford on Avon town. It also was granted the churches or tithes of many places including Trowbridge, Clutton, Timsbury and Pomeroy in Wingfield and mills at Dowlish Wake, Box, Stratton and Timsbury. At Monkton, Broughton Gifford there may have been a small daughter cell and there was a chapel for a while, now lost.
The Priory was dissolved in 1536 and the manor was granted by Henry VIII to Edward Seymour, Viscount Beauchamp, who later became Duke of Somerset.
Some excavations were made by Wade Browne, the then owner in 1841, who found some sculpture fragments and a later owner, Sir Charles Hobhouse published more finds in 1882. More detailed excavations, especially of the site of the church, were carried out in 1911 by the architect-archaeologist Sir Harold Brakspear*. The first church, built in the 12th century, was a small aiseless building with an apse at the east end and transepts, each having an apsidal chapel. A larger church was then built to the north, originally with a choir with apsidal end and ambulatory aisle, incorporating the north aisle and chapel of the old church into its south transept. The old church’s nave became the chapter house. In the 14th century the east end of the big church was altered to have a more English-style square end instead of the apse. Over the crossing there was a tower, which fell in 1438 damaging the east end of the church so much that it was abandoned and the choir moved into the nave.
There are few remains of the monastery and its church visible within the grounds of the Manor House, except the end wall of what may have been the refectory with two Early English pointed windows (the illustration is from Sir Charles Hobhouse’s history of the parish). The most visible is the Monks’ Conduit (well house) west of Farleigh Rise; it is said to be 14th century, but the stone roof dates from 1784. Also in the fields are remains of the Priory’s fishponds.
Several carved stones, including the head of a knight in chain mail, a priest and a corbel in the shape of a head, excavated from the site of the priory are in the Wiltshire Heritage Museum, Devizes.
A drawing of a seal found in excavations carried out by Wade Browne in the mid-19th century featuring an image of St Mary Magdalene
*Brakspear’s findings, with a plan of the church is in the Wiltshire Archaeological & Natural History Magazine volume 43 for 1925: Excavations at the Priories of Bradenstoke, Monkton Farleigh and Kington.