Wenlock Priory, Much Wenlock

The Abbesses’ Way starts here and runs for 20 miles to Shrewsbury Abbey, two monastic sites celebrated for their powerful female leaders

‍Highlights

• ‍‍Former shrine and monastery of St Milburga

St Milburga was both a powerful princess and a devout abbess, roles she managed to hold down simultaneously. By the time of her death in about 725, her lands were as extensive as her reputation for miracles. The site of her former shrine is just a patch of plain grass in the middle of Wenlock Priory. But the impressive ruins are a testament to the ongoing miracles recorded at her tomb, cut off by the Dissolution in 1540. The shrine was at the east end of the ruined chancel, according to the English Heritage guide, but there is no trace of a structure here amid the neatly mown lawns.

The same fate has also befallen the remains of her Saxon building, though archaeologists have found its foundations a few metres from the shrine’s location, in the centre of the ruined church. St Milburga’s father built the first monastery here in 680, and she became its second abbess in 687. It was a double monastery, a community of both men and women living in separate accommodation. For some reason, all these early double monasteries had a woman in charge of both monks and nuns. The male quarters were on the site of the priory, while the nunnery was probably situated where the town’s parish church stands, 130m to the west.

St Milburga clearly made a success of her time as abbess. Shortly before her death, she dictated a will listing the extensive holding of land the abbey had gathered under her control. She was also famous as a miracle worker, bringing a dead boy back to life and rather poetically hanging her veil on a sunbeam. She is often depicted with a goose, since she successfully ordered a flock of the birds to stop stealing her crops.

Her first shrine was later lost, perhaps destroyed during Viking raids, but Much Wenlock remained a holy place. St Milburga’s church was rebuilt as a minster in 1040 by Earl Leofric. He was the husband of another famously independent Saxon woman, Lady Godiva. The pair of them spent a fortune founding and reviving English churches and monasteries. Once again there is nothing visible of this second Saxon building. Everything you can see on this site dates from the 13th century and later, the ruins of Much Wenlock’s third great religious foundation, a Cluniac monastery. The extent of this huge building is largely due to the miraculous rediscovery of her relics here in 1101. Two boys were playing in the ruins of a church—probably the nunnery buildings where the parish church now stands. The ground suddenly gave way, and they fell into a pit containing the saint’s bones. When they were cleaned, the water used for washing them effected a miracle cure. And so they were placed in a shrine at the centre of the Cluniac monastery.

Though the shrine has gone, you can admire other unusual features of this once-mighty community. A huge lavabo, or circular washing basin, survives in the ruins of the cloister, with replicas of its superbly detailed carvings. There is also an upstairs chapel, currently inaccessible, dedicated to St Michael. He often crops up in high places, such as the tops of hills and mountains, so it seems vaguely logical to make him patron of a first-floor chapel.‍

Elsewhere in Much Wenlock

Holy Trinity parish church is a hefty 12th-century structure on the site of St Milburga’s nunnery. It too has nothing left from Saxon times, though the stump of an ancient cross-shaft stands in the churchyard, on the south side of the building. There are some holy wells in the town, unfortunately dry though still used for an annual well-dressing ceremony. Their flow was diverted to prevent flooding, leaving only their stone wellhouses. One of the wells is dedicated to St Milburga. A mystery statue found in St Milburga’s Well is displayed in the town museum, variously described as a late Roman deity or an unknown medieval statue.

Directions‍

Wenlock Priory, Bull Ring, Much Wenlock TF13 6HS‍

www.english-heritage.org.uk (search for Much Wenlock)‍

www.muchwenlockchurch.co.uk (parish church)

W3W: family.variation.foggy

GPS: 52.5978N 2.5550W‍

Wenlock Priory is on the edge of town, a short walk from the large parish church on the main road, Wilmore Street. Leave the church and turn right then immediately right again down Bull Ring road, and the entrance is 230m along here. The priory is run by English Heritage, with full times and dates available online; winter opening is restricted to weekends. Entrance fees £6 adults, £5.40 concessions, £3.60 children over 5. For more details, see the website or tel: 01952 727466. St Milburga’s Well is 30m down St Milburga Row, a little lane off Barrow Street (GPS: 52.5950N 2.5546W).