Saturday April 11th: 14:00 From Lands to Laundry: Women in the life of Notley Abbey
Speaker: Will Strange (Author of the 2024 BAS publication on Notley Abbey)
‘Allow no woman to enter the monastery’: Bishop John Longland to Abbot Richard Ridge of Notley, 1530.
But women did enter the abbey, and supported it in a wide range of capacities: as donors, worshippers, visitors and servants. And sometimes entered the canons’ lives in less legitimate roles. This talk aims to uncover something of the contribution which women made to the life and work of Notley’s all-male community from its founding in 1162 to its dissolution in 1538.