Ab′bess. See Abbey and Abbot.
Abbeville (ancient Abbatis Villa), a town of France, department of the Somme, on the River Somme (which is here tidal), 108 miles N.N.W. of Paris. The town is first mentioned in the ninth century, when it belonged to the Abbey of St. Riquier. It has a Gothic church (St. Vulfran) (begun in the fifteenth century and completed in the seventeenth), which has a magnificent west front in the Flamboyant style. It manufactures woollens, sail-cloth, chemicals, &c. Pop. 20,373.
Ab′bey, a monastery or religious community of the highest class, governed by an abbot, assisted generally by a prior, sub-prior, and other subordinate functionaries; or, in the case of a female community, superintended by an abbess. An abbey invariably included a church. A priory differed from an abbey only in being
scarcely so extensive an establishment, and was governed by a prior. In the English conventual cathedral establishments, as Canterbury, Norwich, Ely, &c., the archbishops or bishops held the abbot's place, the immediate governor of the monastery being called a prior. Some priories sprang originally from the more important abbeys, and remained under the jurisdiction of the abbots; but subsequently any real distinction between abbeys and priories was lost. The greater abbeys formed most complete and extensive establishments, including not only the church and other buildings devoted to the monastic life and its daily requirements, such as the refectory or eating-room, the dormitories or sleeping-rooms, the room for social intercourse, the school for novices, the scribes' cells, library, &c., but also workshops, storehouses, mills, cattle and poultry sheds, dwellings for artisans, labourers, and other servants, infirmary, guest-house, &c. Among the most famous abbeys on the continent of Europe were those of Cluny, Clairvaux, and Citeaux in France; St. Galle in Switzerland, and Fulda in Germany; the most noteworthy English abbeys were those of Westminster, St. Mary's of York, Fountains, Kirkstall, Tintern, Rievaulx, Netley; and of Scotland, Melrose, Paisley, and Arbroath.
Abbiategrasso (a˙b-bē-ä′tā-gra˙s-sō), a town in the north of Italy, 15 miles W.S.W. of Milan. Pop. 13,148.
Ab′bot (from the Syriac abba, father), the head of an abbey (see Abbey), the lady of similar rank being called abbess (abbatissa). An abbess, however, was not, like the abbot, allowed to exercise the spiritual functions of the priesthood, such as preaching, confessing, &c.; nor did abbesses ever succeed in freeing themselves from the control of their diocesan bishop. In the early age of monastic institutions (circ. A.D. 300-600) the monks were not priests, but simply laymen who retired from the world to live in common, and the abbot was also a layman. In the course of time the abbots were usually ordained, and when an abbey was directly attached to a cathedral the bishop was also the abbot, but the functions devolving on the head of a monastery were, in this case, performed by a prior. At first the abbeys were more remarkable for their numbers than for their magnitude, but afterwards many of them were large and richly endowed, and the heads of such establishments became personages of no small influence and power, more especially after the abbots succeeded (by the eleventh century) in freeing themselves from the jurisdiction of the bishop of their diocese. Hence families of the highest rank might be seen eagerly striving to obtain the titles of abbot and abbess for their members. The great object was to obtain control over the revenues of the abbeys, and for this purpose recourse was had to the device of holding them under a kind of trust, or, as it was called, in commendam. According to the original idea, the abbot in commendam, or 'commendator', was merely a temporary trustee, who drew the whole or part of the revenues during a vacancy, and was bound to apply them to specific purposes; but ultimately the commendator or lay abbot in many instances held the appointment for life, and was allowed to apply the whole or a large portion of the revenues to his own private use. Many of the abbots vied with the bishops and nobility in rank and dignity. In England abbots long sat in the House of Lords, ranking next after barons. Seventeen of them were present on 28th June, 1539, the last occasion when the abbots as a body sat in Parliament. The Reformation introduced vast changes, not
only in Protestant countries, where abbeys and all other monastic establishments were generally suppressed, but even in countries which still continued Roman Catholic; many sovereigns, whilst displaying their zeal for the Roman Catholic Church by persecuting its opponents, did not scruple to imitate them in the confiscation of Church property.
Abbot (or Lord) of Misrule, the personage who took the chief part in the Christmas revelries of the English populace before the Reformation. In Scotland he was called Abbot of Unreason.
Abbot, George, Archbishop of Canterbury, was born in 1562 and died in 1633. He studied at Oxford, assisted in the translation of the Bible, was made Bishop of Lichfield in 1609, next year Bishop of London, and in 1611 Archbishop of Canterbury. He retained the favour of James I to the last, but after the accession of Charles I his influence at Court was superseded by that of Laud. He published several works, chiefly theological, and A Brief Description of the Whole World (1599).