550 Stanley Abbey. 



of the present "Abbey Farm," and from its west end is a bank as 

 far as the mill-pond ; the area thus enclosed may have been for the 

 mill and its yard. Another bank runs from the present road, 

 parallel to and about 300 feet from the western ditch, as far as the 

 river, where it stops with a small mound. This boundary being 

 so unlike the others in character may mark a later extension of 

 the precinct. 



The precinct of a Cistercian abbey was invariably entered 

 through an outer and an inner gateway. 



The outer gate, judging from those remaining elsewhere, was not 

 an important structure, but consisted of a wide archway having 

 folding doors and a small lodge for a porter, of which an excellent 

 example still remains at Beaulieu. At Stanley, the outer gate was 

 apparently at the point where the causeway joined the south-western 

 angle of the precinct, and is now marked by slight irregularities 

 in the ground. The outer gate gave entrance to a court, in which, 

 at Clairvaux were granaries, stables, workshops for various purposes, 

 and other buildings, with extensive gardens, occupying an area of 

 about twenty-two acres. In our English examples where the outer 

 court can be traced it varied considerably, but was as at Fountains 

 and Beaulieu of small extent.and contained little more than the mill, 

 which may be due to the less settled condition of the country, and 

 to the desire to put as much as possible within the greater security 

 of the inner gate. 



Stanley was apparently treated in the same fashion, as sinkings 

 in the ground still mark the sites of the inner gateway at about 

 200 feet from the outer, and on the west side of the court between 

 the two gates is apparently the site of the mill spanning the leat 

 from the mill-pond. 



The inner gate was a much more important structure than the 

 outer, both in size and strength, and had in connection with it the 

 gate-house chapel,^ sometimes a distinct building, as at Furness, 

 Eievaulx, Merevale, Kirkstead, and elsewhere, but sometimes the 

 upper part of the gateway itself, as at Beaulieu and Whalley. At 



' The chapel at Furness was next the outer gate, but only 130 feet from the 

 inner, with which it was connected by a pentise. 



