Tintern Abbey

We begin our pilgrimage in Southeast Wales, in the ancient county of Gwent (Monmouthshire). As we enter Wales, look for the signs Croeso i Gymru: Welcome to Wales as you cross the River Severn, and have fun reading the bilingual traffic signs. Lovers of Henry Vaughan, the l7th Century poet, may notice that the Welsh word for automobile is curiously rendered by the Ministry of Transport as Cerbyd (chariot ), the title of one of Vaughan's poems. We soon leave the motorway, however, for It is time to make our first detour. On our way to St.Woolos Cathedral in Newport, instead of going west, we follow the signs east for Chepstow and the Wye Valley.

We soon arrive at one of the most photographed ruins in Britain, those of Tintern Abbey, nestled snugly on the banks of the Wye below those wooded hills made famous by poet William Wordsworth. The remote site was predicted by Giraldus Cambrensis (Gerald of Wales) who wrote that the Cistercians loved to build their "dignified abbeys" in a wilderness or forest. Originally built by the Cistercians in ll3l, Tintern is the most complete of the ruined abbeys of Wales. Much of it was rebuilt in the l3th to l5th century at which latter time it was the largest and wealthiest monastic foundation in the principality.

After 400 prosperous years at Tintern, the Cistercians left the Abbey at its dissolution in l536 at which time all articles of value were catalogued, weighed, and sent to King Henry VIII's treasury. The ruins decayed in magnificent obscurity until l782, when the publication of the Reverend William Gilpin's Observations on the River Wye began the trickle of visitors to Tintern that became a flood after the paintings of William Turner and the writings of William Wordsworth had made the ruined Abbey known throughout Britain. Today's visitors come to admire the great decorated church and the exquisite tracery of its windows. Little known is that William Herbert, the first Welshman to have addressed the House of Commons, wanted to establish a college in the Abbey in the l590's shortly after the Dissolution. The area was also the site of a wire works that lasted from its founding in l566 right up to l900, thus making it sacred, in a special way, to those who study industrial history.

After enjoying the scenery around Tintern, and paying our respects those who built the magnificent abbey, (and lamenting the depredations of the Dissolution and the Reformation), we turn westwards again to retrace our journey down to the estuary of the Severn to Newport.