Walking Scenes on North York Moors and the Cleveland Hills and Hambleton Hills

7. The Village of Osmotherley, it's Parish Church and a Mount Grace Priory Circular Walk

In 2007 the weather on this day in North Yorkshire was pretty grey to start with, BUT, blue skies appeared later and a beautiful end to a grand walking day!

BUT, took some more pictures of Mount Grace Priory in 2019

There is a useful starting point car park just north-east of Cod Beck Reservoir by the west side of Crabdale Beck (Osmotherley can be a bit crowded, especially in the summer).

You cross the beck and head south-east-south around the woods and then head almost due south down the track marked as "Green Lane". You continue south past Rocky Plain (ruined building) eventually turning right (west) to pass by Whitehouse Farm.

Osmotherley coming into sight, viewed from the top of Middlestye Bank.

The track down to Osmotherley has a medieval sunken road feel to it and you cross a footbridge to enter the village near the War Memorial.

The village of Osmotherley comprises many stone cottages, a medieval church, several cafes, pubs, hotels and B & B etc. and a Methodist Chapel of 1754 (bottom left).

A mosaic illustrating the wildlife around Osmotherley is in the entrance to the village hall.

St Peter's Church, Osmotherley, is built on the site of an Anglo-Saxon Church.

The exterior of St Peter's from west (left) to east (right) - 14th century Perpendicular church tower, south door, nave and chancel.

The Norman south doorway with characteristic chevron (zigzag) and beakhead carvings or mouldings

Fragments of carved Anglo-Saxon stones.

Looking east down the nave to the chancel and altar. On the right is the south aisle with its arches and bays.

Stained glass windows - all Victorian?

-

An old, but nicely carved tomb, with the red roofs of the villages houses behind.

Osmotherley is quite a large village, more like a small town, but not too big and built around a triangular green in which stands a modern cross and a large stone slab or table that was used as a market stand - for butter?

We headed north out of the village on the Cod Beck Reservoir road and soon turning left towards Siddle Farm. At Chapel Wood Farm we diverted left down to Mount Grace Priory.

On reaching Mount Grace Priory (Charterhouse founded in 1398), the sun shone on the righteous! The building above was the principal house of the prior and guests and subsequently converted to a private house in 1654, the building would have lost its importance after the Dissolution of the Monasteries in the late 1530's.

Mount Grace Priory Church.

Most of the buildings seen today date from the late 15th century and in its ground design were included two terraces, sophisticated drainage and piped clean water to every cell.

-

Some great stonework of the medieval building still survives with pointed arches, pillars and carved capitals.

-

The six pictures above illustrate the life of a Carthusian monk at Mount Grace Priory - small garden and cell (entrance shown in middle right picture), simple furniture, bed, loom etc. They could live an almost self-contained life, and very sustainable!

Bits of older stonework are part of 17th and 19th/early 20th century additions to the gatehouse and range.

 Mount Grace Priory has the typical plan of a medieval Charterhouse based on the enclosures of the Cloister and the Inner Court. Between them was the church and the Prior's cell and the Prior was the only member of this religious community allowed access to the outside world and was responsible for the management of the social and religious affairs of the community.

The current entrance.

Some of the 17th century facade.

The lower gardens of Mount Grace Priory.

Leaving Mount Grace Priory we retraced our steps back up to Chapel Wood Farm and headed north on the Cleveland Way passed the WT and TV station and on to the east of Arncliffe Wood.

Welcome to Scarth Wood Moor and looking north-east to the Cleveland Hills.

-

Stone trod, still heading north-east.

Looking west.

Remains of a cross? before swing round to head south on the Cod Beck Reservoir and Osmotherley road.

Heading south on the Osmotherley road in the late afternoon autumnal sunlight.

The car park and Cod Beck Reservoir.

The car park at the autumn sunset - beautiful red-brown-orange colours of the 'dead' bracken.

More pictures of Mount Grace Priory (May 2019)

The Cafe at Mount Grace Priory

Some of the surrounding walls on approaching the entrance to Mount Grace Priory.

View across the Inner Court of Mount Grace Priory.

View of the Church from the main house of Mount Grace Priory.

View across the Inner Court to the Church and monastic cells of Mount Grace Priory.

The church of Mount Grace Priory

Looking across the Inner Court  to the main house of Mount Grace Priory.

The main house looking out over the Inner Court

The history of Mount Grace Priory exhibition: Good plumbing and the origins of Mount Grace Priory.

The origins of the Carthusians and Mount Grace Priory as a place of solitude.

View of the upper terrace gardens through the windows of the house of Mount Grace Priory.

The entrance to the main house of Mount Grace Priory.

The Upper Terrace gardens of Mount Grace Priory.

The gardens were designed by Chris Beardshaw for English Heritage - who manage all of Mount Grace Priory, which is owned by the National Trust.

Lots of lovely shrubs and flowers in the gardens of Mount Grace Priory.

Shrubs and flowers in the Deli Garden of Mount Grace Priory.

The 'pond', stream and Summer House beyond the Deli Garden of Mount Grace Priory.

More on Mount Grace Priory (adapted from Wikipedia)

Mount Grace Priory, in the parish of East Harlsey, North Yorkshire, England, within the North York Moors National Park, is today the best preserved and most accessible of the nine medieval Carthusian houses (charterhouses) in England. Mount Grace Priory is set in woodlands and founded in 1398 by Thomas Holland, 1st Duke of Surrey, the son of King Richard II's half-brother Thomas, Earl of Kent. Mount Grace Priory was the last monastery established in Yorkshire, and one of the few founded anywhere in Britain in the period between the Black Death (1349–50) and the Reformation. Mount Grace Priory was a fairly small establishment, with space for a prior and twenty-three monks.

Mount Grace Priory consisted of a church and two cloisters. The Great Cloister, to the north of the church, had seventeen cells for monks whilst the southern Lesser Cloister had six cells for the lay brothers.

Upon the abdication of King Richard II, Holland and others of the king's supporters attempted to assassinate his recently crowned successor, Henry IV, at New Year, 1400, but were captured and executed. Holland's body was eventually recovered and, in 1412, re-buried in the charterhouse that he had founded. The orphaned priory of Mount Grace, bereft of its founder and the income that had been granted to it by Holland and King Richard, depended upon royal largesse for its income for more than a decade.

On the founding of Mount Grace Priory, Thomas Holland ordered that the monks were to pray for the king, queen and several members of the royal family, and for himself and his heirs, and many others including John and Eleanor Ingelby. The prior of the Grande Chartreuse allowed him to nominate Robert Tredwye as the first rector (although the charter refers to him as the first prior) and to dedicate the priory to "the Blessed Virgin and Saint Nicholas". The second part of the dedication lapsed and the priory became known as the House of the Assumption of the most Blessed Virgin in Mount Grace. Nicholas Love, prior of Mount Grace, succeeded in creating a link between the priory and the Lancastrian administration, in part by submitting his "Mirror of the Blessed Life of Jesus Christ" to Thomas Arundel, archbishop of Canterbury, Henry IV's chancellor, in support of the archbishop's campaign against Wycliffism, and by granting Arundel confraternity in the spiritual benefits of Mount Grace in exchange for his provision of material benefits. In 1410 the house was formally incorporated into the order, and Love named as fourth rector and first prior. (But note the disparity with the original charter.

The house of Mount Grace Priory received a number of grants and charters :

In March 1399 Richard II granted the monks a charter of liberties and franchises in general terms, including the right to mine lead. In May 1399, at the request of the Duke of Surrey, he gave them the alien priories of Hinckley in Leicestershire, Carisbrooke in the Isle of Wight, and Wareham in Dorset. They were also given, for as long as England and France were at war, lands belonging to the alien priory of Saint Mary of Lire, at Evreux, in Normandy. When Wareham Priory was lost, soon after Henry's accession, the king granted the monks £100 a year from the Exchequer until they were able to get lands of equivalent value (£1,000) and a barrel of the 'better red wine of Gascony' to be received at Hull every Martinmas. In 1412 Henry V confirmed the gift of Hinckley to support five monks, to pray for himself and Thomas Beaufort, Earl of Dorset. In 1421 he gave the monks four further alien priories, Long Bennington, Minting and Hagh (Hough-on-the-Hill) in Lincolnshire, and Field Dalling in Norfolk, which redeemed the yearly grant of £100. In 1439 Mount Grace Priory asked parliament to confirm their title – the number of claimants to the estate meant that they dared not continue to build – and Henry VI did so in 1440.

Following this, the gifts and income continued to be given to Mount Grace Priory:

In 1456 Sir James and Lady Elizabeth Strangways of Harlsey Castle granted the priory the advowson of the church of Beighton, in Derbyshire. In 1462 the king granted the manor of Atherstone, Warwickshire (part of the alien priory of Great Ogbourne in Wiltshire), for the relief of the poor. In 1471 the king granted the Yorkshire manor of the alien priory of Begare in return for three daily masses being said for the king and the souls of his family (a practice known as frankalmoign) but in 1472 it was re-granted to Eton College, who had been previous holders of a grant. In 1508 the Prior of Mount Grace Priory leased the chapel of East Harlsey and manor of Bordelby to the Prior of Guisborough for fifty years of at a yearly rent of £8. In 1522, in the will of Sir Thomas Strangways, a Lady Chapel at Mount Grace is mentioned and directions given for the priest who sang masses there.

Mount Grace Priory became an important locus for the production and preservation of contemplative and devotional texts: among writers professed as monks there were John Norton and Richard Methley (the latter known for his Latin translations of The Cloud of Unknowing and of the anonymous English translation of Marguerite Porete's Mirror of Simple Souls). The only surviving manuscript of The Book of Margery Kempe also belonged to Mount Grace Charterhouse.

With the dissolution of monasteries, Mount Grace Priory was closed in 1539 during the dissolution of the monasteries by King Henry VIII. Some of the monks had (in 1534) attempted to avoid taking the oath of supremacy but, after they were imprisoned, the last prior, John Wilson, handed the keys over to Henry VIII's representatives. The site of Mount Grace Priory then passed into private ownership.

Mount Grace was valued at £382 5s. 11½d. gross (£323 2s. 10½d. net) which included £104 6s. 8d. from spiritualities in Lincolnshire, £164 from lands outside Yorkshire and the rest from its home county of Yorkshire. In December 1539 the brothers were awarded pensions totalling £195 – £60 plus the house and chapel called the Mount for the prior, £7 for each of eight priests and small sums for eighteen.

The dissolution of Mount Grace, and life in the priory in the preceding years, is vividly reimagined by Lucy Beckett in her 1986 novel The Time Before You Die.

Unlike monks of other orders, who live in common, the daily life of the Carthusian monks, to this day, live as hermits, each occupying his own cell (more like a small house), and coming together only for the nocturnal liturgical hours, and on Sundays and feast-days, in the church; the other hours are sung by each monk separately in his cell. Except for the singing of the liturgy and conversation "on grave subjects" during a weekly three-hour exercise walk, Carthusians are silent, and their diet is strictly vegetarian.

The monks at Mount Grace Priory were very conscious of hygiene and sanitation; included in the reconstructed cell is a reconstructed latrine and visitors are able to investigate the ditches used as sewage systems.

previous page <-> next page

 Sutton Bank and NW Moors Index

North Yorkshire Northern England * docspics photos images pictures © Phil Brown * Tourist information North York Moors National Park Walks, Holidays in North Yorkshire England, Tourism information, Top tourist attractions, luxury hotels, B&B, budget hostels, self-catering holiday cottages, country pubs inns, good local food eating out restaurants, walking holidays, touring coach tours, interesting historic towns and buildings, quiet villages, guided walks docspics images photos of Mount Grace Priory © Phil Brown Tourist information on Mount Grace Priory, Walks near, Holidays near Mount Grace Priory, England, Top tourist attractions of Mount Grace Priory, luxury hotels in Mount Grace Priory, self-catering holiday cottages near Mount Grace Priory, B&B near Mount Grace Priory, friendly pubs near Mount Grace Priory, cafes near Mount Grace Priory, eating out in fine restaurants near Mount Grace Priory, weekend breaks near Mount Grace Priory, wining & dining weekends near Mount Grace Priory, walking holidays around the Mount Grace Priory, touring coach tours including Mount Grace Priory, pretty villages near Mount Grace Priory, historic town/village of Mount Grace Priory, museums near Mount Grace Priory, local art galleries near Mount Grace Priory, guided walks from Mount Grace Priory, excellent fell hill walking around Mount Grace Priory, rambling, exploring the landscape near Mount Grace Priory. good places to eat near Mount Grace Priory tourist attractions near Mount Grace Priory tourist information for places near Mount Grace Priory good places for wining and dining near Mount Grace Priory good walks near Mount Grace Priory properties for sale near Mount Grace Priory, renting a flat of house near Mount Grace Priory, property for rent near Mount Grace Priory, houses for sale near Mount Grace Priory, lettings near Mount Grace Priory places to rent near Mount Grace Priory holiday cottage accommodation near Mount Grace Priory docspics images photos of Mount Grace Priory northwest England © Phil Brown Tourist information on Mount Grace Priory, Things to do in Mount Grace Priory, What to see in Mount Grace Priory, Walks in Mount Grace Priory, weekend breaks in Mount Grace Priory holidays in Mount Grace Priory, Top tourist attractions of Mount Grace Priory, luxury hotels in Mount Grace Priory, self-catering holiday cottages in Mount Grace Priory, B&B in Mount Grace Priory, friendly pubs in Mount Grace Priory, cafes in Mount Grace Priory, eating out in fine restaurants in Mount Grace Priory, bargain holiday breaks in Mount Grace Priory, wining & dining weekends in Mount Grace Priory, touring coach tours including Mount Grace Priory, pretty villages in Mount Grace Priory, historic towns in Mount Grace Priory, visiting museums in Mount Grace Priory, local art galleries in Mount Grace Priory, guided walks from Mount Grace Priory, history of Mount Grace Priory, architecture of Mount Grace Priory trains to Mount Grace Priory historic houses in Mount Grace Priory historic churches in Mount Grace Priory historic buildings good places to eat in Mount Grace Priory tourist attractions in Mount Grace Priory tourist information for things to do and see in Mount Grace Priory good places to eat out in Mount Grace Priory good walks from Mount Grace Priory tourist attractions properties for sale in Mount Grace Priory, renting a flat of house in Mount Grace Priory, property for rent in Mount Grace Priory, houses for sale in Mount Grace Priory, lettings in Mount Grace Priory places to rent in Mount Grace Priory holiday cottages accommodation in Mount Grace Priory