Full Report for Listed Buildings
The list description is not intended to be a complete inventory of what is listed: it is principally intended to aid identification. By law, the definition of a listed building includes the entire building (i) and any structure or object that is fixed to the said building and ancillary to it and (ii) any other structure or object that forms part of the land and has done so since before 1 July 1948, and was within the curtilage of the building, and ancillary to it, on the date on which said building was first included in the list, or on 1 January 1969, whichever was later.
Summary Description
Reference Number
958
Building Number
Grade
II*
Status
Designated
Date of Designation
24/10/1950
Date of Amendment
20/07/2000
Name of Property
Denbigh Friary
Address
Location
Unitary Authority
Denbighshire
Community
Denbigh
Town
Locality
Denbigh - Town
Easting
305939
Northing
366562
Street Side
Location
Situated at the lower (eastern) end of the town, at the foot of the hill; at the end of the lane, itself leading E off Rhyl Road.
Description
Broad Class
Religious, Ritual and Funerary
Period
History
The Carmelite Friary at Denbigh is said to have been founded by Sir John Salusbury of Lleweni in the last quarter of the C13; his tomb and brass (recording his death in 1289) are recorded here, together with several later Salusbury tombs, in a mid C17 description. Speed, however, ascribed the foundation of the friary to a John de Sunimore in the C14. It is possible that the latter gave a further endowment to an already established house. Whatever the case, much of the surviving fabric of the church is of late-C13 date. Various bequests to the community are recorded, including twenty marks towards the building of new cloisters by Henry Standish, Bishop of St. Asaph, in the early C16. Standish (1518-35) is recorded as having lived at the friary 'in the Bishop's Chamber,' as did his successor, Robert Purefoy. The friary was suppressed at the Dissolution in 1537 and the church and some of the claustral buildings appear to have been adapted as houses. An inventory taken at the time describes the church as being slated and having a leaded timber steeple; cloisters, a chapterhouse, a gatehouse and the other usual friary buildings are also itemised. The church was subsequently used as a wool store and a malt house, before being gutted by fire in 1898.
Exterior
Ruins of the former friary church; aisleless, with continuous nave and chancel plan. Of rough-dressed limestone with some buff/brown sandstone dressings and later brown brick infill. The church is roofless and has lost its W gable; the N and S walls stand to wall plate height and the E gable is complete. The latter has a large pointed-arched Perpendicular tracery window of 5 lights with cusped tracery head (early bricking-up). Three window openings and an entrance to the S side and 2 window openings to the N side, that to the chancel a (blocked) 5-light window with grouped, arched lights. On the S wall of the choir is a heavily-weathered 3-seat sedilia, with a simple piscina to its E. The chancel and much of the nave have stone-flagged floors.
Interior
Reason for designation
Listed Grade II* as the highly important ruins of a mediaeval Carmelite friary church.
Scheduled Ancient Monument (AM 23 RCAM 126).
Cadw : Full Report for Listed Buildings [ Records 1 of 1 ]
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