{{Short description|Benedictine abbey in Carmarthenshire, Wales}} {{Use dmy dates|date=April 2022}} [[Image:St Mary's Church, Kidwelly - geograph.org.uk - 58886.jpg|thumb|right]]
'''Kidwelly Priory''' was a [[Benedictine]] house in [[Kidwelly]] ({{lang|cy|Cydweli}}), [[Carmarthenshire]], [[Wales]]. It was founded in about 1110 by [[Roger of Salisbury|Roger]], [[bishop of Salisbury]] (d. 1139), a trusted supporter of England's [[King Henry I of England |King Henry I]].
==Site== Physically, the [[priory]] was established in Carmarthenshire on the south side of the [[River Gwendraeth|Gwendraeth Fach River]] while [[Kidwelly Castle]] and the town, which preceded the priory, were located on the north side.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Murphy |first1=K. |title=The Archaeology of the Middle Towns of Southwest Wales: Kidwelly |url=https://heneb.org.uk/archive/dyfed/wp/wp-content/uploads/historic-towns-2020/EPRN_125663_KIDWELLY.pdf |website=Heneb - The Trust for Welsh Archaelogy |publisher=Dyfed Archaeological Trust |access-date=23 Feb 2026}}</ref>
The extent of the priory’s holdings can be discerned from the fact that what were once called "the priory fields" are now the gardens in Lady Street at Kidwelly.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Emmanuel |first1=Graham Tudor |title=Exploring Religious Influences in Kidwelly: A Compilation of Research Findings |url=https://www.peoplescollection.wales/sites/default/files/Exploring%20Religious%20Influences%20in%20Kidwelly%20Master_1.pdf |website=People's Collection Wales |access-date=23 Feb 2026}}</ref>
The size of the priory could not have been large, as the number of residents at the priory was always small.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Williams |first1=Glanmor |title=Kidwell Priory |url=http://www.kidwellyhistory.co.uk/Articles/Priory/Priory.htm#14 |website=Kidwelly History |access-date=23 Feb 2026}}</ref>
==History== In 1908, the vicar of Kidwelly, David Daven Jones, demonstrated how "the history of Kidwelly in the middle ages is bound up with the Norman Conquest and its consequent exactitude and elaboration in the re-adjustment of things, both civil and religious",<ref>{{cite book |last1=Jones |first1=David Daven |title=A History of Kidwelly |date=1908 |publisher=Spurrell |location=Carmarthen |page=16 |url=https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/3e/A_History_of_Kidwelly_%28IA_historyofkidwell01jone%29.pdf |access-date=23 Feb 2026}}</ref> for in the wake of the [[Norman Conquest | conquest of England]] came “the Norman Conquest of Wales.”<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Bryant |first1=D. |title=The Marcher Lordship of Glamorgan |journal=Wales: The National Magazine |date=July 1914 |volume=6 |url=https://www.google.com/books/edition/Wales/pAYxAQAAMAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=%22conquest+of+wales%22&pg=PA234&printsec=frontcover |access-date=23 Feb 2026}}</ref>
[[King Henry I of England|King Henry I]], son of [[William the Conqueror]], was on the throne of [[England]] in 1102 when he first became aware of Roger le Poer (Roger the Pauper), who had been a priest in [[Caen]], [[Normandy]].<ref>{{cite web |title=Roger le Poer (died 1139) |url=https://mondes-normands.caen.fr/angleterre/ensavoirplus/biographie/rogerlepoer.htm |website=The Normans, a European People |access-date=23 Feb 2026}}</ref> Seeing talent, Henry raised Roger up, making him Bishop of Salisbury, treasurer of the realm, and later [[justiciar]].<ref>{{cite DNB|wstitle= Roger of Salisbury |volume= 49 |last= Kingsford |first= Charles Lethbridge |author-link= Charles Lethbridge Kingsford| pages= 103-106 |short=1}}</ref> In 1106, upon the death of the Welsh prince Hywel ap Goronwy, Henry almost immediately assigned the [[commote]]s of {{lang|cy|Cydweli}} (Kidwelly) and Carnwyllion, both formerly in Hywel's control, to Bishop Roger, who created from them the [[marcher lord]]ship of Kidwelly.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Williams |first1=Glanmor |title=Kidwelly Priory |url=http://www.kidwellyhistory.co.uk/Articles/Priory/Priory.htm}}</ref>
In about 1110, after the building of a [[motte-and-bailey castle]] at Kidwelly and the town growing up around it, Bishop Roger granted one [[carucate]] of land to [[Sherborne Abbey]] in [[Dorset]], its prior, Turstin (or Thurstan), and his successors for the building of a priory. The boundaries were to extend "from the ditch of the new mill to the house of one Balba, and thence to the river, running through the alder grove, to the way and from the way as the river ran to the sea." It also included the hill of Solomon. This undertaking was made on behalf of the souls of Roger's patron, [[King Henry I of England|Henry I]], along with his queen, [[Matilda of Scotland]], and their sons, in addition to the souls of his family and himself.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Williams |first1=Glanmor |title=Kidwelly Priory |url=http://www.kidwellyhistory.co.uk/Articles/Priory/Priory.htm#14 |access-date=23 Feb 2026}}</ref>
Along with Roger, Bishop of Salisbury, the marcher lord William de Londres and, later, his grandson [[Maurice de Londres|Maurice]] are bound to the history of Kidwelly in Carmarthenshire. The Londres family, who normally worked with, not against, Bishop Roger, are remembered more for their lordship of the castle rather than the priory, though William was one of the witnesses to the donation of land to Sherborne.<ref>{{cite book |title=The Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments and Constructions in Wales and Monmouthshire: Vol. V County of Carmarthen |date=1917 |publisher=His Majesty's Stationery Office |location=London |page=50 |url=https://www.google.com/books/edition/An_Inventory_of_the_Ancient_Monuments_in/7gAABQpMpAYC?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=maurice+de+londres+kidwelly&pg=PA50&printsec=frontcover |access-date=23 Feb 2026}}</ref> Since William de Londres was among the Normans who undertook the Conquest of Glamorgan in the late eleventh century,<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Bryant |first1=D. |title=The Marcher Lordship of Glamorgan |journal=Wales: The National Magazine |page=235 |url=https://www.google.com/books/edition/Wales/pAYxAQAAMAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=%22conquest+of+wales%22&pg=PA234&printsec=frontcover}}</ref> his involvement in southern Wales was substantial.
After Henry I died in 1135, a disputed succession occurred between Henry’s daughter [[Empress Matilda|Matilda]] and his nephew [[Stephen of Blois]], which led in 1138 to a civil war called [[the Anarchy]]. In 1139, the bishop lost favour with the new king, Stephen, in a quarrel about the properties of the bishop’s nephews, a result of which was that the Bishop Roger lost all of his lands, including Kidwelly, which passed to [[Maurice de Londres]].<ref>{{cite EB1911 |wstitle= Roger, bishop of Salisbury |volume= 23 |page= 454 |short=1}}</ref> Bishop Roger died in 1139 and, in turn, Maurice de Londres in 1166, at which time Kidwelly passed to Maurice’s brother, Thomas de Londres, and after successive generations to [[Henry IV of England|King Henry IV]], whose mother was Blanche of Lancaster, a descendant of Lord Thomas.<ref group="note"> In his genealogy of the lords of Kidwelly, D. D. Jones indicates that [[John of Gaunt]] married Maud [[Maud, Countess of Leicester|Plantagenet]], though he actually married [[Blanche of Lancaster|Blanche]], sister of Maude. Both women were descendants of Thomas de Londres.</ref> Kidwelly Priory was dissolved in 1539 by [[Henry VIII]].<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Bryant |first1=D. |title=The Marcher Lordship of Glamorgan |journal=Wales: The National Magazine |date=July 1914 |volume=6 |page=234 |url=https://www.google.com/books/edition/Wales/pAYxAQAAMAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=%22conquest+of+wales%22&pg=PA234&printsec=frontcover |access-date=23 Feb 2026}}</ref> Today the [[parish church]], [[Church of Saint Mary, Kidwelly|St Mary's]],<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.coflein.gov.uk/en/site/301847/details|title=St Mary's Church (Priory Church)|work=Coflein Database Record|publisher=[[Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Wales]]|access-date=28 November 2016}}</ref><ref>[http://www.britainexpress.com/wales/carmarthenshire/churches/kidwelly.htm Kidwelly, St Mary's Church] BY David Ross.</ref> is the only extant remnant of the priory, though it dates to the fourteenth century, c. 1320, not to the twelfth.<ref>[http://www.monasticwales.org/article/12 Remnants of Kidwelly Priory].</ref>
==Priors of Kidwelly== Priors of Kidwelly<ref>[http://www.kidwellyhistory.co.uk/Articles/Priory/Priory.htm#2 Kidwelly Priory by GLANMOR WILLIAMS].</ref> * 1240 Abraham * 1268 Gervase * 1284 Ralph de Bemenster * 1301 Galfridus de Coker * 1346 Robert Dunster * 1361 John Flode * 1399 Philip Morevyle * 1404 John de Kidwelly * 1428 Robert Fyfhede * 1438 John Cauntville * 1482 John Sherborne * 1487 John Henstrige * 1520 John Whitchurche * 1534 John Godmyston * 1539 John Painter
==Notes== {{reflist|group=note}}
==References== {{reflist}}
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[[Category:Benedictine monasteries in Wales]] [[Category:1539 disestablishments in Europe]]