Castle Acre priory, Norfolk
Castle Acre is a smallish Norfolk village (a few miles northeast of Kings Lynn) that boasts not only the remains of the impressive Norman castle which gave it its name, but this Cistercian priory, founded in the eleventh century by monks from Clairvaux, who often chose to build their monasteries in the back of beyond. The priory church, mostly built in the twelfth-century, and the other monastic buildings have been in a pretty ruinous state since the suppression of England’s monasteries under Henry VIII, but 12th-century facade of the church, with its elaborate arcading, has held up surprisingly well, and the prior’s house continued to be occupied – and altered – in Tudor times and beyond. The site is now in the care of English Heritage.
Click on the images for full-size versions.
