Saffron Walden
Saffron Walden is a town in the North-West of Essex. It is South of Audley End, the location of Walden Abbey, now Audley End House.
Walden Castle is now a ruin and can be visited in the town of Saffron Walden.
Curiously Saffron Walden does not have a specific section in Thomas Wright's History and Topography of Essex. It is referred
in relation to other communities and Audley End is also referenced. This is strange as Walden Castle and the Abbey are important
in the account of Geofrey de Mandeville and the Anarchy.
Audley End - Walden Abbey
Audley End House is
Audley End House is a largely early 17th-century country house outside Saffron Walden, Essex, England. It is a prodigy house,
known as one of the finest Jacobean houses in England.
Audley End is now one-third of its original size, but is still large, with much to enjoy in its architectural features and varied
collections. The house shares some similarities with Hatfield House, except that it is stone-clad as opposed to brick.[1]
It is currently in the stewardship of English Heritage but long remained the family seat of the Barons Braybrooke, heirs to the
estate of whom retain a portion of the contents of the house, the estate, and the right to repurchase as an
incorporeal hereditament.[2] Audley End railway station is named after the house.
Top
Audley End was the site of Walden Abbey, a Benedictine monastery that was dissolved and granted to the Lord Chancellor Sir Thomas
Audley in 1538 by Henry VIII. The abbey was converted to a domestic house for him with the conversion of the church which had three
floors inserted into the nave, the rest of the church itself being demolished. In addition a great hall was constructed on the site
of the abbott's lodging, the same position occupied by the later Jacobean great hall.[
Thomas Audley, 1st Baron Audley of Walden
Thomas Audley being Lord Chancellor to Henry VIII was a good candidate to assume the lands and buildings at Walden Abbey.
In a similar manner to the de Veres at Earls Colne, the Priory or Abbey passed to a Chancellor, or a least a descendant of one!
