2-889-243 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

Ruins of the Priory of Mount Grace, East Harlsey, York, 1850. View of the '...beautiful and extensive ruins of a Carthusian Priory [in Yorkshire], founded a.d. 1396, by Thomas de Holland, Duke of Surrey...and dedicated to the Blessed Virgin and St. Nicholas...The secluded situation and romantic gloom of this monastery seem to have been particularly adapted to the austerities of the rigid order of the Carthusians...A Gothic archway forms the entrance into the chief quadrangle, the outer walls of which enclose about three acres of ground, and are still standing fantastically covered with ivy. The inner court is surrounded by double walls, where we may still detect...the cells...of the sterner devotees, or the delinquents of the order. The church, which is now in ruins, was in the form of a cross; the tower, yet perfect, rising from the centre, and supported by four arches'. From "Illustrated London News", 1850.