Whitby Abbey

Whitby Abbey as seen from the side. The sea is just behind me, below the cliffs.

"Whitby Abbey was a 7th-century Christian monastery that later became a Benedictine abbey. The abbey church was situated overlooking the North Sea on the East Cliff above Whitby in North Yorkshire, a centre of the medieval Northumbrian kingdom. The abbey and its possessions were confiscated by the crown under Henry VIII during the Dissolution of the Monasteries between 1536 and 1545.

Since that time, the ruins of the abbey have continued to be used by sailors as a landmark at the headland. Since the 20th century, the substantial ruins of the church have been declared a Grade I Listed building and are in the care of English Heritage; the site museum is housed in Cholmley House just to the right of this picture. (see adjacent photo -PiP)

The abbey is a setting in Bram Stoker’s Dracula (1897). Count Dracula as a creature resembling a large dog which came ashore at the Whitby headland runs up the 199 steps to the graveyard of St Mary's Church in the shadow of the abbey ruins. The abbey is also described in Mina Harker’s diary."

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