The ruins of Whitby Abbey in North Yorkshire, England, completed by drone lighting. The ruins of Whitby Abbey are among the most celebrated sights of North Yorkshire. The first monastery here, founded in 657 AD, became one of the most important religious centres in the Anglo-Saxon world. In 664 AD, it was setting for Synod of Whitby, a landmark in history of the Church in England. The headland is now dominated by shell of 13th Century AD, church of Benedictine abbey founded after Norman Conquest. The abbey performed a lot of services to the local community providing for their religious needs through the running of churches, providing employment to a great number of people, and supporting local crafts and industries in the area. The age of monasticism was about to come to an abrupt end. In the South of England, a process known as the Suppression of the Monasteries began in 1509 AD. Numbers were dwindling in the great monastic houses. Novices were in short supply and many religious houses were merged to ensure survival or sold to turn the assets into cash for use elsewhere. On 14th December 1539, Henry VIII ordered Whitby Abbey to close. The dissolution of the monasteries had reduced the old way of life to dust. The result of a whimsical monarch demanding everything go his way. Upon closure, Whitby Abbey was stripped of all the fixtures and fittings of value; glass from the windows, lead from the roof and left to decay. The roof of the great church and the central tower all eventually fell leaving behind the ruins we know and love today. During WWI, in December 1914, a German battlecruiser shelled Whitby from North Sea, destroying the west wall and nave. Further damage was done at the hands of locals, scavenging material for their own building projects and gardens, much as others had done before them. Cholmsley family built an impressive private house adjacent to the Abbey; they plundered the ruins heavily in the making of this grand residence. More ruins/unfinished buildings completed this way: cutt.ly/UM57zfq 📷 DRIFT/Cyberdrone. #archaeohistories