One Aben, having escaped the cruel treatment Hengist perpetrated on the Barons and great men of the land, hid himself in the south of Oxfordshire for a great while, and the people of the place, pitying him, built him a house and chapel. This then was the beginning of the monastical institution in “Abendun,” so called, after the fugitive. The town of Abingdon, with its narrow winding streets and quaintly gabled houses, has grown up round the mitred monastery of many centuries ago. So closely are the ruins surrounded by houses that there is some difficulty in defining the original site of the abbey. The approach to the ruins is through a gateway of Perpendicular work, built probably about the end of the 14th century. The parapet is battlemented, and over the centre arch may be seen a canopied niche containing the figure of the Blessed Virgin, the patronal saint of the abbey. A few yards further on after turning slightly to the right one reaches the rest of the monastical remains, which consist only of the guest house, with its adjoining abbot’s or prior’s house. The guest house presents at first sight a somewhat barn-like appearance; it is worthy however of closer inspection. It has two storeys--the ground floor forming the day room and the upper the dormitory. The prior’s house, built in the 14th century, is also a two-storeyed building. A flight of wooden steps, put up for the convenience of the visitor, leads through a pointed doorway into the upper apartments. In a direct line with the entrance is a wall dividing the storey into two rooms, of which the one to the right contains some imposing remains of a columned fireplace, a blocked-up pointed window and stairway door; and the other to the left, a blocked-up window. There are open windows on either side of the entrance, each lighting up one of the apartments. The kitchen or crypt forms the ground floor of the prior’s house, from the one single octagonal column of which spring the ribs that support the groined roof. The fireplace is to the right and facing the entrance is a doorway which formerly communicated with the abbey brook, now known as the mill stream. After being used as a malt house for several years the buildings have been restored by the Abingdon Corporation, by whom the room over the gateway is used as council chamber. To the left on passing through the gateway is the site of the former magnificent abbey church, enclosed in the private grounds of the Bishop of Reading. The whole of the foundations are unfortunately covered by greensward; but it is still possible to gain some idea of the immense size and bold outline of the structure. William of Worcester gives the following dimensions-- Nave, 180 feet. Two Towers west end, 100 feet high. Large central tower, 36 feet square. Choir, with chapel at east end, 162 feet. Central transepts, 174 feet broad. Other transepts, 138 feet broad.