GLASTONBURY, a market-town having separate
jurisdiction, locally in the
hundred of Glaston-Twelve-Hides, county of SOMERSET,
71 miles (N. by E.) from
Somerton, and 124 (W. by
S.) from London, containing
2630 inhabitants. This
place, which is of very great
antiquity, is situated in a
marshy tract, called by the
Britons Avalon, from its abounding with apples; and
Ynys-wytryn, or the glassy island; by the Saxons it was
named Glastn-ey, a term of similar signification, and after
the erection of its monastery, which formed a small
town, it was called Glastn-a-byrig, from which its present
name is immediately deduced. That it is a place
of very remote antiquity is certain, but its origin is involved
in so much obscurity, that it is difficult to separate
its authentic from its legendary history.
chiefly distinguished for its celebrated abbey, said to hare
been originally founded by Joseph of Arhnathea, whom
Philip, the Apostle of Gaul, sent to preach the gospel in
Britain, and who, having arrived in this island, rested
with his companions on a small eminence, half a mile to
the south-west of the present town, still called Weary-all
hill, and established here the first society of Christian
worshippers in Britain. In the most ancient charters of
the monastery, Glastonbury is styled "The fountain and
origin of all religion in the realm of Britain." When the
church erected by Joseph had fallen into decay, Devi,
Bishop of St. David's, rebuilt it on the same spot, and
on its subsequent decay, it was restored by twelve persons
from the northern parts of England. St. Patrick,
who came from Ireland about 439, is said to have
spent thirty years of his life in this convent, and to
have formed the brethren, who previously lived in huts
scattered round the church, into a regular community,
restoring also the primitive form of Christianity, which
after the death of Lucius, the first Christian king of
Britain, had fallen into disuse. About the year 530,
David, Archbishop of Menevia, with seven of his
suffragans, retired to this place, and greatly improved
the church, to the east end of which he added a chapel,
dedicated to the Holy Virgin, and enriched the altar
with a sapphire of inestimable value. The celebrated
King Arthur, after the fatal battle with his nephew
Mordred, was interred in this isle: his remains are said
to have been discovered in the reign of Henry II., who
ordering a search to be made, a leaden cross was found,
with a Latin inscription in the rude characters of that
age, to this effect, " Here lies the famous King Arthur,
buried in the Isle of Avalon." Beneath was observed
a coffin-like excavation in the solid rock, containing
the bones of a human body, supposed to be those of
Artmir, which were then deposited in the church, and
covered with a sumptuous monument. St. Augustine,
on his arrival in Britain, visited Glastonbury, and
attempted to introduce into the abbey the rules of the
order of St. Benedict, but the measure was not -attended
with success. The monastery, during the Heptarchy,
had beenmuch favoured by successive monarchs, and
in 708, Ina, King of the West Saxons, took down the
conventual buildings, which were greatly dilapidated,
and rebuilt the abbey from its foundation in a style
of superior splendour. In 942, Dunstan, who was appointed
abbot by King Edred, and to him that monarch
gave the unlimited command of his treasury for
the improvement of the monastery; he enlarged the
conventual buildings in a style of unrivalled magnificenccj
and in a short time completed an establishment,
which, under his superintendence, became the
"pride of England, and the glory of Christendom,"
furnishing superiors to all the religious houses in
the kingdom. Edgar, who had a palace within two
miles of the town, in a romantic situation, at a place
still called "Edgarley," now a hamlet in the parish of
St. John, endowed the abbey with several estates, and
invested the monks with extensive privileges. The
abbots were sovereigns within the Isle of Avalon, into
which neither the king nor any of the bishops could
enter without their permission; they sat among the
barons in parliament, and enjoyed a revenue superior
to that of most monasteries in the kingdom. Of the
palace of Edgar there are no other vestiges than two
wolves heads and a pelican, placed in the front of a
modern house; the former conveying a direct allusion
to the tax imposed by him on the Welch princes, for
the extirpation of wolves within the realm. At the time
of the Conquest, William, not content with curtailing
the power of the abbots, and with exacting tribute from
the monastery, deprived them of their privileges, and
seized on theirpossessions; he imposed on the monks
an abbot of his own nomination, whose tyranny ultimately
compelled him to retire into Normandy. Under
his successor, the abbey recovered many of the estates
of which it had been deprived 5 and during the abbacy
of Henry de Blois, brother of King Stephen, whose
liberality and prudence equally promoted the interest of
the monks, and the cultivation of literature among
them, it regained the greater part of its confiscated
wealth, and retrieved its prior fame and importance.
A considerable portion of the abbey having been destroyed
by fire in 1184, it was restored by Henry II.,
who granted the abbots a charter, confirming all the
privileges which had been obtained from his predecessors;
but its internal tranquillity was greatly interrupted
by the violent contentions between the monks
and the bishop of Wells, with respect to the nomination
of the abbots, which continued, with trifling
intermissions, until the Reformation. In 1276, the
abbey was much injured by the shock of an earthquake,
which threw down the church of St. Michael on
the Torr Hill. The strict discipline ptevailing in the
establishment for a time delayed its preconcerted fate;
but, in 1539, its venerable abbot, Whytyng, refusing to
surrender to the commissioners of Henry VIII., was
arraigned and condemned for high treason, and, with
two of his monies, being drawn on a sledge to Torr Hill,
was hanged and quartered; his head was placed over
the entrance to the abbey, and his members were exposed
at Bath, Bridg-water, Wells, and Ilchester. At the
dissolution of this celebrated monastery, which had flourished
from the earliest introduction of Christianity into
Britain, the revenue was £3508. 13. 4. The abbey
and its dependencies comprehended a space of nearly
sixty acres: the ruins consist chiefly of the chapel of
St. Joseph, and fragments of the conventual church:
the prevailing character of the chapel is Norman, but
the details and enrichment, which are in good preservation,
are in the early style of English architecture.
The remains of the church are of a less embellished
character, but exhibit much of the pure simplicity of
the early English style, with some portions of abater
date. The abbot's kitchen is the most entire, and is
probably of more recent erection than the other buildings;
it is of an octagonal form, having four fire-places;
the roof is finely vaulted, and from the centre rises
an octagonal pyramid, crowned with a double lantern, o
curious design: the ruins are richly overspread with
ivy, and present a striking memorial of departed grandeur.
The town stands on the declivity of a considerable
eminence nearly in the centre of the county, and consists
of a spacious street forming the principal thoroughfare,
intersected nearly at right angles by another
of smaller extent: the houses are in general low, -but
there are several of more recent erection and of more
respectable appearance; and many houses in different
parts of the town have been built entirely of stone
taken from the ruins of the abbey. The George Inn
was anciently appropriated by the abbots as a place
of entertainment for pilgrims visiting the shrine of St.
Dunstan, and still retains much of its original character
and decoration: the old manor-house and tribunal of
justice are interesting relics; and a beautiful modern
building, harmonising in its style of architecture with
the venerable remains by which it is surrounded,
has been erected by the present proprietor of the
abbey land. The town is well paved and lighted by
act of parliament, and supplied with water from a fine
spring issuing from the ridge of a hill, three quarters
of a mile distant, and collected in an ancient reservoir
of stone, whence it is conveyed by pipes into the town.
The principal branches of manufacture are those of
stockings and a coarse sort of gloves, which have superseded
the woollen manufacture formerly carried on
here, and at present afford employment to several hundred
persons in the town and neighbourhood. It is in
contemplation to form a communication between this
town and Bridg-water, by means of a canal from the
river Parret, at Boroughbridge. The market days were
formerly Tuesday and Saturday, the former has been
discontinued, and the latter is now only for butchers'
meat: the fairs are on the Wednesday in Easter-week,
September 19th, called the Torr fair, principally for
horses, October 10th, and the Monday week after St.
Andrew's day. The government, by charter of Queen
Anne, is vested in a mayor, recorder, seven superior,
and sixteen inferior, burgesses, assisted by a town clerk,
two coroners, and subordinate officers. The mayor,
who is chosen annually from the superior burgesses,
the recorder, who must be a barrister of three years
standing, and the late mayorj are justices of the peace
within the borough. The corporation hold quarterly
courts of session for the trial of all offenders within
the borough; and a court leet for the hundred is held
in the town.
Glastonbury comprises the parishes of St. Benedict
and St. John the Baptist, and gives name to a peculiar
jurisdiction which extends over several parishes. The
living of St. Benedict's is a donative annexed to the perpetual
curacy of St. John's, jointly endowed with £800
private benefaction, £400 royal bounty, and £600 parliamentary
grant, and in the peculiar jurisdiction and
patronage of the Bishop of Bath and Wells. The churchwardens
of St. John's are a body corporate with a common
seal, and have estates producing at present about £ 500
per annum, of which part was granted in the year 1300.
The churches are both interesting structures in the
later style of English architecture, with towers of very
graceful and highly enriched character, of which the
former has open turrets and battlements, and more
decoration than the latter, which is notwithstanding a
fine composition. There are places of worship for
Baptists, the Society of Friends, Wesleyan Methodists,
and Independents, which last has an endowment of £80
per annum. A National school, in which thirty boys
are instructed, is supported partly by subscription,
and partly by an appropriation of £20 per annum,
arising from property bequeathed by James Levinston,
in 1666, for charitable uses. A rent-charge of £4, left
by the Earl of Godolphin, is paid to a school-mistress for
teaching ten children; and £5 per annum, arising from
two turnpike deeds assigned by Mrs. Honora Gould, is
paid for teaching twelve female children to read and
sew. The Upper and Lower almshouses were founded
by the abbots of the monastery, and since the dissolution
have been supported by an annual grant from the
crown; the former, which is in a greatly dilapidated
state, is inhabited by ten aged men, and the latter, which
has  been lately rebuilt by a grant from the crown, is
inhabited by ten aged women; attached to each is a
small chapel, and in the hall of each, one additional
tenant is allowed to reside in expectation of the first
Vacancy. On the summit of Torr Hill, at a short distance
from the town, is the tower of St. Michael, the only
part remaining of a splendid church and monastery
erected on the site of a former one which was destroyed
by an earthquake in 1276; over the west entranceis
a sculptured figure of St. Michael, holding in his hand a
pair of scales, in one of which is the bible, and in the
other thef devil, aided by an imp in a fruitless effort to
outweigh the sacred volume. Weary-all hill, the spot
where Joseph of Arimathea and his disciples are stated
to have rested after their pilgrimage, is connected with
a legendary account of the origin of a species of thorn,
called the Glastonbury thorn: on this hill, the legend
relates, Joseph struck his staff into the ground, which
immediately taking root, grew up into a flourishing
tree, producing in succeeding ages what was called the
holy thorn, there being still some trees of that specie's
in the neighbourhood. Equally absurd with this is a
variety of other legendary tales which have been interwoven
into the history of this place. Some chalybeate
springs were discovered here, which about the middleof
the last century were numerously attended by invalids
from Bath, Bristol, and other parts of the country,.and
such was the- repute of their medicinal properties, that
the water was sent in bottles to London. A great variety
of organic remains consisting chiefly of nautili, cornw
ammonis, bivalves, &c., have been found imbedded in
the quarries near Torr Hill. Henry Fielding, the celebrated
novelist, was a native of Sharpham park, in this
parish; and among the many illustrious personages who
have been interred here, are several of the Saxon kings,
together with a numerous train of noblemen, bishops,
abbots, and priors. Glastonbury formerly conferred the
title of baron on the family of Greville, which became
extinct on the death of the late lord without issue.