Institution

Whitby Abbey

657 · 7th century · Also known as Streoneshalh

Whitby Abbey was a monastery on the North Yorkshire coast founded in 657 by King Oswiu of Northumbria, with Abbess Hild ruling a double house of monks and nuns. In 664 it hosted the Synod of Whitby, at which Oswiu chose Roman over Irish practice for dating Easter. The poet Cædmon was a lay brother there. Refounded as a Benedictine abbey after the Norman Conquest, it was dissolved in 1539.

Whitby Abbey
Image: Jeff Buck · CC BY-SA 2.0 · Wikimedia Commons

Mentioned in 1 state history

Kingdom of Northumbria

See also

Cite this entry
APA
The Epoch Institute. (2026). Whitby Abbey. In The Epoch Institute Encyclopedia. https://the-epoch-institute.org/encyclopedia/whitby-abbey
MLA
“Whitby Abbey.” The Epoch Institute Encyclopedia, The Epoch Institute, 2026, https://the-epoch-institute.org/encyclopedia/whitby-abbey. Accessed .
Chicago
The Epoch Institute. “Whitby Abbey.” The Epoch Institute Encyclopedia. 2026. https://the-epoch-institute.org/encyclopedia/whitby-abbey.
Harvard
The Epoch Institute (2026) ‘Whitby Abbey’, The Epoch Institute Encyclopedia. Available at: https://the-epoch-institute.org/encyclopedia/whitby-abbey (Accessed: ).

Last reviewed October 2026Random entry ↻