Tintern

The name Tintern may derive from the Welsh din + d/teyrn, meaning "rocks of the king". A ford, known as Tintern Ford, stretched across the tidal River Wye and was in use in Roman times. After the Romans withdrew from Wales, the kingdom of Gwent emerged, and, according to tradition, one of their 6th-century kings, Tewdrig, abdicated to become a hermit in Tintern. He came out of retirement to defeat the invading Saxons in battle: probably at Tintern ford, shown as a 6th-century battle site on Ordnance Survey records. Three cairns on a hillside 200 m and 1800 m above and to the west of the ford are known locally as "Devil's Lap Stones". There is a local tradition that they are burial mounds of…

Tintern Abbey was founded beside the river by Walter de Clare on 9 May 1131, during the reign of King Henry I. It was the second Cistercian foundation in Britain, and its monks came from a daughter house of Cîteaux in France. interior]] The present-day remains at Tintern are a mixture of building works covering several centuries. Between 1270 and 1301 the abbey was rebuilt, and when it was completed around four hundred monks lived in the complex. The abbey's land was divided into agricultural units or granges, and local people provided farm labour and served the abbey and its many visitors. For 400 years, it dominated the economy of its surrounding area. During some of this period the area…