St. Bartholomew's Nunnery

St. Bartholomew's Nunnery

HER Number
1431
District
Newcastle
Site Name
St. Bartholomew's Nunnery
Place
Newcastle
Map Sheet
NZ26SW
Class
Religious Ritual and Funerary
Site Type: Broad
Religious House
Site Type: Specific
Benedictine Nunnery
General Period
MEDIEVAL
Specific Period
Medieval 1066 to 1540
Form of Evidence
Documentary Evidence
Description
The origin of the Nunnery is uncertain, but some authorities suggest foundation before 1086. It had 20 nuns in 1322, 11 at the time of its suppression in 1540. The buildings are said to have been demolished by Robert Anderson in perhaps the late 16th century. The precint lay south of High Friar Street, east of the Franciscan friary, and behind the burgages of Newgate Street. It was approached via a gate in Nuns Lane. The precise site of the buildings is unknown, though 19th century writers suggested that the remains of medieval structures survived until the 1880s/1890s in the block bounded by Nun Street, Grainger Street, Newgate Street and Nuns Lane. Grainger's construction work in 1834/5 produced human and architectural remains, and miscellaneous artifacts.
Easting
424740
Northing
564280
Grid Reference
NZ424740564280
Sources
<< HER 1431 >> Letters & Papers Foreign & Domestic Henry VIII, XIV, pt. 2, no. 773
Letters & Papers Foreign & Domestic Henry VIII, XV, nos. 15, 1032
J. Brand, 1789, History of Newcastle, I, 204-34; II, opp. 47, no. 10
M.A. Richardson, 1842, Local Historian's Table Book, Historical Division, II, 19-20
M.A. Richardson, 1844, Local Historian's Table Book, Historical Division, IV, 200
Newcastle Courant, 1834, 9.viii.1834, p.4 col. 5
Newcastle Courant, 1835, 21.iii.1835, p. 4 col. 4
Newcastle Library Local Studies, Newcastle Cuttings - Newcastle Daily Chonicle, Old Newcastle: Traces of the Nuns II, 40
D. Knowles & R.N. Hadcock, 1953, Medieval Religious Houses England and Wales, 215; Barbara Harbottle, 2009, The Medieval Archaeology of Newcastle in Diana Newton and AJ Pollard (eds), 2009, Newcastle and Gateshead before 1700, page 26, 38