Editing Minster-in-Thanet (section)

==History==
{{further|Isle of Thanet#History}}
[[Archaeology]] has shown a [[Bronze Age]] settlement at Minster-in-Thanet.<ref>Jessup, Frank W., ''Kent History Illustrated'' (Kent County Council, 1966) {{ISBN|9780900947063}}</ref> The area became part of the [[Roman Empire]] under the [[Roman Emperor|emperor]] [[Claudius]]. Around 450AD, the [[Jutes]] arrived in the Minster area and established a settlement.<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://www.minster-in-thanet.org.uk/villagehistory.shtml |title="History", Minster-in-Thanet |access-date=15 January 2020 |archive-date=15 January 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200115061157/http://www.minster-in-thanet.org.uk/villagehistory.shtml |url-status=live }}</ref>

===Anglo-Saxon===
In 597 [[Augustine of Canterbury]] is said, by the [[Bede|Venerable Bede]], to have landed with 40 men at nearby [[Ebbsfleet, Thanet|Ebbsfleet]], in the parish of Minster-in-Thanet, before founding a [[monastery]] in [[Canterbury]]; a cross marks the spot of his landing.

Minster itself originally started as a [[Monastery|monastic]] settlement in 670 AD. The buildings are still used as nunneries today.<ref name=FF/> The first abbey in the village was founded by St [[Domneva]], a widowed noblewoman, whose daughter St [[Mildrith|Mildred]], is taken as the first [[abbess]]. The tradition is that Domneva was granted as much land as a hind could run over in a day, the hind remains the village emblem, see also [[Kentish Royal Legend]]. The boundary defined by the hind was known as Cursus Cerve or St Mildred’s Lynch.<ref name=MappaThanetiInsule>{{cite web|url =https://cudl.lib.cam.ac.uk/view/MS-TRINITYHALL-00001/90 |access-date =15 September 2024|title=Mappa Thaneti Insule from Historia Monasterii S Augustini Cantuariensis|author =Thomas of Elmham|date =1907|publisher =Trinity Hall|location =Cambridge, England|orig-date =15th Century}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|title=Delineations Historical and Topographical, of the Isle of Thanet and the Cinque Ports|year=1817|last =Brayley|first =E.W.|volume =1|publisher =Sherwood, Neely, and Jones|location =London, England|pages =1–192}}{{rp|p=15}}</ref> The abbey was extinguished by [[Viking]] raiding. The next abbess after St Mildred was [[Edburga of Minster-in-Thanet|St Edburga]] daughter of King [[Centwine of the West Saxons]].<ref>{{cite web  | url=http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/basis/boniface-letters.html  | title=Medieval Sourcebook: The Correspondence of St. Boniface  | access-date=13 September 2008  | archive-date=19 September 2008  | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080919230621/http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/basis/boniface-letters.html  | url-status=live  }}</ref>

The third known abbess was Sigeburh, who was active<ref>[[William George Searle]], onomasticon ([[Cambridge University Press]] Archive, 1879) [https://books.google.com/books?id=Q788AAAAIAAJ&dq=Sigeburh+of+Thanet&pg=PA418 page 418].</ref> around 762 [[Anno Domini|AD]] and is known from the [[Secgan]] [[hagiography]] and from [[Royal charter]]s.<ref>[[David Rollason]], ‘[[Mildrith]] (fl. 716–c. 733)’, ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography'', ([[Oxford University Press]],[http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/18697 2004] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210123221259/https://www.oxforddnb.com/view/10.1093/ref:odnb/9780198614128.001.0001/odnb-9780198614128-e-18697;jsessionid=A9972AA64EB717EE116F52ECEA943C18 |date=23 January 2021 }}).</ref> In 761AD [[Offa]], king of the [[Mercia]]ns, granted Sigeburh a toll-exemption which king [[Æthelbald of Mercia|Æthelbald]] had previously granted to [[Abbess]] [[Mildrith]]. Again in about 763 [[Anno Domini|AD]] [[Eadberht II]], [[king of Kent]], granted the remission of toll on two ships at [[Sarre, Kent|Sarre]] and on a third at [[Fordwich]].<ref>''Charters of the St Augustine’s Abbey, Canterbury, and Minster-in-Thanet'', ed. S. E. Kelly, Anglo-Saxon [[Charter]]s 4 ([[Oxford]]: Published for The British Academy by [[Oxford University Press]], 1995), p. 179.</ref> It has been stated that in gaining these privileges, she may have been taking advantage of Æthelbald's political weakness.<ref>Johannes Hoops, ''Reallexikon der germanischen Altertumskunde'', Vol. 24 (Walter de Gruyter, 1968) [https://books.google.com/books?id=yL99vdKCUhkC&q=Sigeburh+&pg=PA298 page 298].</ref>

Vikings attacked the surrounding area in 850 AD.<ref>A. Forte, R. Oram, and F. Pederson. ''Viking Empires''. 1st. ed. (Cambridge: [[Cambridge University Press]], 2005), [https://books.google.com/books?id=_vEd859jvk0C&q=Thanet page 67].</ref>

===Norman===
{{More citations needed section|date=September 2024}}
The parish church of [[St Mary]]-the-Virgin is largely [[Norman architecture|Norman]] but with significant traces of earlier work, the problems of which are unresolved. The [[nave]] is impressive with five [[bay (architecture)|bay]]s, and the [[crossing (architecture)|crossing]] has an ancient chalk block [[Vault (architecture)|vaulting]]. The [[chancel]] is Early English with later [[flying buttress]]es intended to halt the very obvious spread of the upper walls. There is a fine set of [[misericord]]s reliably dated around 1400. The tower has a curious turret at its southeast corner that is locally referred to as a [[Saxon]] watch tower but is built at least partly from [[Caen]] stone; it may be that it dates from the time of the conquest but is built in an antique style sometimes called Saxo-Norman. A doorway in the turret opens out some two metres above the present roof line.

The [[church building|church]] was used by both the brethren of the second [[abbey]], a dependency of [[St Augustine's Abbey|St Augustine's Abbey in Canterbury]], and as a [[parish church]]. Socket holes in the piers of the crossing suggest that, as well as a [[rood screen]], there was a further screen dividing [[nave]] and [[transept|crossing]], such as still exists at [[Dunster]] in [[Somerset]]. This abbey surrendered during the [[dissolution of the monasteries|dissolution]] in 1534.

===Nineteenth century===
The 1876 [[Ordnance Survey Great Britain County Series]] map<ref>{{cite web |title=Ordnance Survey, Kent XXXVII (includes: Ash; Minster; Ramsgate; Sandwich; Worth.) - Ordnance Survey Six-inch England and Wales, 1842-1952 |url=https://maps.nls.uk/view/102343543 |website=maps.nls.uk |publisher=National Library of Scotland |access-date=5 May 2023}}</ref> shows a [[Wesleyan Church|Methodist (Wesleyan)]] chapel in St Mildred's Road; on the 1898 OS map<ref>{{cite web |title=Ordnance Survey, Kent XXXVII.NW (includes: Ash; Minster; Monkton.) - Ordnance Survey Six-inch England and Wales, 1842-1952 |url=https://maps.nls.uk/view/101429274 |website=maps.nls.uk |publisher=National Library of Scotland |access-date=5 May 2023}}</ref> it has become [[Catholic Church|Roman Catholic]] and been renamed "St Mildred's R.C. chapel", also being referred to as "St Mildred's church and [[clergy house|presbytery]]". It later closed but as permission to demolish it and build houses on the site was denied in 2010,<ref>{{cite web |last1=Fray |first1=Pam |title=Geograph:: St. Mildred's church and presbytery |url=https://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/4881254 |website=www.geograph.org.uk |access-date=5 May 2023}}</ref> it was converted into a private residence.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Kessler |first1=P. L. |title=Gallery: Churches of Kent |url=https://www.historyfiles.co.uk/ChurchesBritain/SouthEast/Kent_Thanet18.htm |website=The History Files |access-date=5 May 2023}}</ref>

===Twentieth century===
[[Minster in Thanet Priory|Minster Abbey]] is a house incorporating remains of the [[Anglo-Saxon]] abbey and alleged to be the oldest continuously inhabited house in England. It now houses the village's third religious community, a [[priory]] of [[Roman Catholic]] [[Benedictine]] sisters that is a daughter community of St. Walburg, [[Eichstätt]] in [[Bavaria]]. It was settled in 1937 by [[refugee]]s fleeing [[Nazi Germany]] and continues to flourish as an international community.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.minsterabbeynuns.org/history-modern.html |title=Minster Abbey |access-date=13 September 2008 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080907205105/http://www.minsterabbeynuns.org/history-modern.html |archive-date=7 September 2008 }}</ref> The Priory has the care of a relic of St Mildred that had been in the care of a church in [[Deventer]] in the [[Netherlands]] since the [[Protestant Reformation|Reformation]].<ref>{{cite web|url=http://monasticmatrix.usc.edu/monasticon/?function=detail&id=963 |title=Monasticon: Community: Minster in Thanet |work=Monastic Matrix |publisher=[[University of Southern California]] |access-date=14 September 2008 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110927174045/http://monasticmatrix.usc.edu/monasticon/?function=detail&id=963 |archive-date=27 September 2011 }}</ref>