| More information : An early nunnery was built at Hackness (Hacanos) by St Hilda in 680 according to Bede and was probably destroyed during the Danish raids of 867-69 AD. Bede's special mention of the 'dormiturium sororum' may imply that there was also men at the convent, possibly a resident chaplain and lay brothers. (1) Rigold listed Hackness in his article on 'Double Minsters', a term he describes as "a modern name for an institution of the Merovingian age - a community of both sexes, each living under some sort of rule, with the abbess of the female half as president of the whole". (see SE 99 SE 26 for AS cross fragments and SE 99 SE 56 for AS carved stone, which are probably associated with this site). (1-3) |