Hovedøya Abbey (''Hovedøya kloster'') was a medieval era

Cistercian The Cistercians, () officially the Order of Cistercians ( la, (Sacer) Ordo Cisterciensis, abbreviated as OCist or SOCist), are a Catholic religious order of monks and nuns that branched off from the Benedictines and follow the Rule of Saint ...

monastery on the island of

Hovedøya Hovedøya is one of several small islands off the coast of Oslo, Norway in the Oslofjord. The island is quite small, no more than 800 metres across in any direction, the total area is 0,4 square kilometre. It is well known for its lush and green ...

Oslofjord The Oslofjord (, ; en, Oslo Fjord) is an inlet in the south-east of Norway, stretching from an imaginary line between the and lighthouses and down to in the south to Oslo in the north. It is part of the Skagerrak strait, connecting the Nor ...

outside of

Oslo Oslo ( , , or ; sma, Oslove) is the capital and most populous city of Norway. It constitutes both a county and a municipality. The municipality of Oslo had a population of in 2022, while the city's greater urban area had a population of ...

, Norway.

History

The monastery was founded on 18 May 1147 by monks from

Kirkstead Abbey Kirkstead Abbey is a former Cistercian monastery in Kirkstead, Lincolnshire, England. The monastery was founded in 1139 by Hugh Brito, (or Hugh son of Eudo), lord of Tattershall, and was originally colonised by an abbot and twelve monks from Fo ...

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

island, and dedicated to the

Blessed Virgin Mary Mary; arc, ܡܪܝܡ, translit=Mariam; ar, مريم, translit=Maryam; grc, Μαρία, translit=María; la, Maria; cop, Ⲙⲁⲣⲓⲁ, translit=Maria was a first-century Jews, Jewish woman of Nazareth, the wife of Saint Joseph, Jose ...

and Saint Edmund. A church dedicated to Edmund already stood on the island, and the monks took this over as the abbey church, modifying it to meet Cistercian requirements. The rest of the monastery follow a modified Cistercian building plan, to take into account a small local hill. The church itself is built in Romanesque style; the rest of the monastery was presumably

Gothic Gothic or Gothics may refer to: People and languages *Goths or Gothic people, the ethnonym of a group of East Germanic tribes **Gothic language, an extinct East Germanic language spoken by the Goths **Crimean Gothic, the Gothic language spoken b ...

. During the medieval period the abbey was one of the richest institutions in

Norway Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic country in Northern Europe, the mainland territory of which comprises the western and northernmost portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula. The remote Arctic island of Jan Mayen and t ...

, holding over 400 properties, including a fishery and timber yards.

End of the abbey

Political turmoil during the succession to the throne of Denmark-Norway led to the end of the monastery. The abbot, having supported the former king Christian 2, was imprisoned for supporting him in the hope of saving the catholic monasteries. He was imprisoned from January till July 1532. In the meantime Christian made two attempts to become king again by taking the Akershus fortress, but did not succeed. The monks who had fled joined Hans after he became priest in the church of St. Hallvard. The monastery had been burned in the start of April by a Danish rescue expedition. Any hope the order might have had in restoring the rich abbey was dashed 4 years later, when the Reformation swept over Denmark-Norway. The site was later used as a quarry for stone for

Akershus Fortress Akershus Fortress ( no, Akershus Festning, ) or Akershus Castle ( no, Akershus slott ) is a medieval castle in the Norwegian capital Oslo that was built to protect and provide a royal residence for the city. Since the Middle Ages the fortress h ...

. The remaining ruins are nevertheless among the most complete of a medieval Norwegian monastery. Between the years 1930–1938, architect Gerhard Fischer performed excavations on site.

References

Other Sources

*Fischer, Gerhard (1974) ''Klosteret på Hovedøya : et Cistercienseranlegg'' (Oslo:Fortidsminneforeningen)

External links

Ruins of Hovedøya
www.visitoslo.com Christian monasteries established in the 12th century Cistercian monasteries in Norway Buildings and structures in Oslo Ruined abbeys and monasteries Ruins in Norway Church ruins in Norway Monasteries dissolved under the Norwegian Reformation {{Oslo-church-stub