page_title: Bolton Abbey
section_title: Bolton Priory
hierarchical_section_title: Bolton Abbey / Bolton Priory
caption_attribution_description: Bolton Abbey, Albumen print
context_page_description: Bolton Abbey in Wharfedale, North Yorkshire, England, takes its name from the ruins of the 12th-century Augustinian monastery now known as Bolton Priory. The priory, closed in the 1539 Dissolution of the Monasteries ordered by King Henry VIII, is in the Yorkshire Dales, next to the village of Bolton Abbey.
  The estate is open to visitors, and includes many miles of all-weather walking routes. The Embsay & Bolton Abbey Steam Railway terminates at Bolton Abbey station one and a half miles/2.5 km from Bolton Priory.
context_section_description: The monastery was founded at Embsay in 1120. Led by a prior, Bolton Abbey was technically a priory, despite its name. It was founded in 1154 by the Augustinian order, on the banks of the River Wharfe. The land at Bolton, as well as other resources, were given to the order by Lady Alice de Romille of Skipton Castle in 1154. In the early 14th century Scottish raiders caused the temporary abandonment of the site and serious structural damage to the priory.  The seal of the priory featured the Blessed Virgin Mary and the Child and the phrase sigillum sancte Marie de Bolton.
  The nave of the abbey church was in use as a parish church from about 1170 onwards, and survived the Dissolution of the Monasteries.
  Building work was still going on at the abbey when the Dissolution of the Monasteries resulted in the termination of the priory in January 1540. The east end remains in ruins. A tower, begun in 1520, was left half-standing, and its base was later given a bell-turret and converted into an entrance porch. Most of the remaining church is in the Gothic style of architecture, but more work was done in the Victorian era, including windows by August Pugin. It still functions as a church today, holding services on Sundays and religious holidays.
  Bolton Abbey churchyard contains the war grave of a Royal Flying Corps officer of the First World War.
caption: 1850s Albumen print by Roger Fenton
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