The first account of the dissolution of the monasteries for fifty years--exploring its profound impact on the people of Tudor England "This is a book about people, though, not ideas, and as a detailed account of an extraordinary human drama with a cast of thousands, it is an exceptional piece of historical writing."--Lucy Wooding, Times Literary Supplement Shortly before Easter, 1540 saw the end of almost a millennium of monastic life in England. Until then religious houses had acted as a focus for education, literary, and artistic expression and even the creation of regional and national identity. Their closure, carried out in just four years between 1536 and 1540, caused a dislocation of people and a disruption of life not seen in England since the Norman Conquest. Drawing on the records of national and regional archives as well as archaeological remains, James Clark explores the little-known lives of the last men and women who lived in England's monasteries before the Reformation. Clark challenges received wisdom, showing that buildings were not immediately demolished and Henry VIII's subjects were so attached to the religious houses that they kept fixtures and fittings as souvenirs. This rich, vivid history brings back into focus the prominent place of abbeys, priories, and friaries in the lives of the English people.

Dom David Knowles surveys the monastic life and activities in the early Tudor period. He examines different abbots, bishops and others that shed new light on the fortunes of the Cistercian abbeys and on the influence upon the monks of the new humanist education.

The medieval treasure house, consisting of sacristy, vestry and treasure rooms was the depository for the ecclesiastical treasure belonging to a church, holy vessels, vestments, altar hangings, candlesticks and priceless liturgical books and reliquaries. It was carefully designed to convey the message of its status and function. A book devoted to these medieval museums which housed such precious materials is long overdue. Ironically, the interest in the objects that they conserved has often resulted in ecclesiastical treasure being removed to new museums, leaving their former places of protection in need of protection themselves.