[O]n 18th June step back in time to speak with the monks who lived, ate and worked in the Cumbria abbey.
Furness Abbey was a large and powerful monastery during the Middle Ages, gaining vast wealth from the wool trade. It owned lands across Furness and high up into the Lake District fells. By the time of the dissolution in 1537-8 it had become the second richest abbey in the country but the monks living in the monastery certainly didn’t live a plush and exuberant lifestyle.
They slept in large draughty communal dormitories, woke at 2am and didn’t go back to bed until 8pm. They worked throughout the day, between visiting church for service or mass, and had a predominantly vegetable based diet generally eating only once a day.
On the 18th June you will find a group of 16th Century monks in the cloister range of the abbey waiting to speak with you about the life they led as well as display some of the chores they undertook.
You will also be able to get hands on to design your own illuminated letter, have a go writing with a quill and grind corn into flour. There will be a children’s trail as well as two tours of the site, led by a monk, taking place at 1pm and 3pm.
Monks’ Life at Furness Abbey | 18th June 2017 | 10am – 5pm
Standard entry fees apply.
