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More than 5000 entries on the history, culture and life of Britain (published in 1993 by Macmillan, now out of print)
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Tintern Abbey
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(8km/5m N of Chepstow) Romantically situated ruin among wooded hills on a curve of the river Wye. It was founded as a *Cistercian house in 1131, but the ruins are of 13–14C buildings. Although the roof of the abbey church was removed at the *dissolution of the monasteries, the walls with their great Gothic windows survive to their full height. The beauty of Tintern became appreciated in the late 18C, when the Wye valley was singled out as one of the first examples of the *picturesque. The abbey was much visited by watercolourists, J.M.W. *Turner among them.
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But its status as Britain's foremost romantic ruin derives from the young *Wordsworth having included in *Lyrical Ballads his 'Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey', verses suffused with tender melancholy: ... I have learned To look on nature, not as in the hour Of thoughtless youth; but hearing often-times The still, sad music of humanity...
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