Whitby Abbey
Whitby Abbey stands on the East Cliff above the Yorkshire fishing town of Whitby in a position of extraordinary drama, its Gothic ruins silhouetted against the North Sea sky in a profile that has been one of the defining images of the Yorkshire coast since the Romantic period and which inspired Bram Stoker during his stay in Whitby in 1890 to place scenes from Dracula in the town and abbey, creating an association that has brought a particular kind of Gothic-minded visitor to Whitby ever since. The abbey was one of the most important religious sites in early medieval England and its ruins, managed by English Heritage, are among the finest in Yorkshire.
The original monastery at Whitby was founded in 657 by St Hilda, the remarkable Abbess of exceptional authority who presided over a double monastery of both men and women and was the host of the Synod of Whitby in 664, one of the most important events in the history of the English church, at which the Roman and Celtic traditions of Christianity debated and resolved their differences over the date of Easter and the form of the monastic tonsure. The synod's decision in favour of the Roman tradition aligned the English church with continental Christianity and was a decisive moment in the history of Christian Europe.
The current ruins are those of the later Benedictine abbey founded in the eleventh century on the site of the earlier monastery, built in the Early English and later Gothic styles that provide the soaring pointed arches and tall windows that create the dramatic silhouette above the town. The ruins retain considerable height in the east end and north wall of the nave and give a powerful impression of the abbey's original scale and architectural ambition.
The combination of the abbey, the old town below with its 199 steps, the Dracula association and the fishing harbour make Whitby one of the most characterful and most visited small towns on the English east coast.