“How many hearts have here grown cold,
That sleep these mouldering stones among!
How many beads have here been told—
How many Matins here been sung!”
Of this renowned Abbey the existing remains convey but a very inadequate idea. The parish church is formed out of part of the original abbey-church; of the chapter-house the walls only remain; and of the ruins scattered around, the original use, size, and distribution have not yet been ascertained. That it was an extensive edifice, and exhibited in its style and proportions all the higher characteristics of Cistercian monasteries, may be taken on the credit of what remains. The foundation is fixed in the year 1147, and the process of erection must have been contemporaneous with that of Tinterne—a temple of the same Order, whose taste and affluence, during that and the following century, have left so many gorgeous monuments in England and Wales.
Dugdale fixes the date of Margam Abbey in the year 1147. It was founded by Robert, Earl of Gloucester—so often named in this work—and dedicated to the Blessed Virgin. In this, also, the annals of Margam—written by a monk of the Abbey—agree, and mention the date of its foundation as that of the year in which the founder departed this life. The chronicle, printed in the second volume of Gale’s Scriptores, called “Annales de Margam,” is a history of general scope, extending from the year of the Conquest to that of 1232, and throws but little light upon the particular affairs of the Monastery in which it was written. It is a history of the times, not of the Abbey. It gives the names, however, of four abbots, mentions three or four incursions of the Welsh, and remarks that Margam and Beaulieu in Hampshire were the only monasteries among the Cistercians that were released from King John’s extortions in 1210, to which reference has been already made in our notice of Tinterne. The plea upon which Margam escaped these severe taxations was, that, both in his progress to and from Ireland, the King and his suite had been liberally entertained by the abbot and monks of Margam.
With respect to the inroads noticed in these “Annals,” we are told that—“This year, M.C.LXI, in the month of October, the Welsh burnt down our granary or barn; an act which was quickly followed by divine vengeance.” Again, “In M.CC.XXIII, (he says,) in the course of one week, wicked men have destroyed upwards of a thousand of our sheep, with two houses. In the following year they wantonly slew two of our servants in one day, while engaged in the performance of their duty; and also, immediately thereafter, a youth who had charge of the flock.” But the fourth irruption was still more serious; for “they burnt to the very ground our grange at Penwith, with many cattle, including the steers; they next depopulated the grange of Rossaulin, burnt many sheep, drove off the cows, and put one of our servants wantonly to death; they then took the cattle of the grange of Theodore Twdor, killed many on the road, took the rest with them. Lastly, they set fire to the Abbey houses in different places, and great were the flocks that perished in the flames.”—Annal. de Marg. Scriptores a T. Gale, tom. ii. pp. 7, 16, 17.
Leland ascribes to this Abbey the privilege of sanctuary: “Habet privilegium sanctuarii, sed quo rarissime aut nunquam utuntur Cambri—” but of which the natives very rarely or never made any use. According to the same authority, Margam Abbey had four daughter-houses in Ireland, namely—Kyrideyson, S. Crux, Maio, and Chorus Benedictus.
Abbots.—William, the first Abbot, died in M.C.LIII; Andrew, the second, two years later; and it was probably in the short time of the latter, or that of his successor, that the altar of the Holy Trinity in the abbey church was consecrated by William, Bishop of Llandaff. Gilbert, the third Abbot, resigned in July, M.CC.XIII, died the following year at Kirksted, and was succeeded by Abbot John, of whom nothing is recorded by the annalist.
A large collection of original charters belonging to this Abbey is still preserved with the Harleian manuscripts in the British Museum. The common seal of the Abbey, appendant to a deed, dated 1518, has been elegantly lithographed, as we read in the Monasticon, by the care of the Rev. W. Traherne. At the Dissolution, the sum total of the revenues of Margam Abbey amounted to one hundred and eighty-eight pounds, fourteen shillings sterling; the clear income to seven pounds less. The site was granted by the King to Sir Rees Maxwell, Knt. The Abbey was afterwards the seat of Thomas, Lord Mansell; and passed afterwards into the Talbot family. In early times the buildings of this Abbey are described as affording specimens of the richest style of conventual architecture. But these characteristics are no longer applicable to the, ruins before us; for time and the quarry-man, probably, have done much to deface the beauty and even form of the original structure.
Crypt—Margam Abbey.