This abbey, like so many others, stands in a fertile holm or flat ground
in the quiet valley of the Water of Luce, about one mile and a half from
the town of Glenluce. Although sometimes called _Vallis Lucis_, the name
is probably the same as Luss in Dumbartonshire, meaning a place of
herbs. The abbey was founded in 1190 by Roland, Lord of Galloway, and
colonised by Cistercians from Melrose.
The buildings were at one time “extensive and magnificent,” but the
ruins are now very scanty. Of the church (Fig. 1054) there remain only
parts of the south wall of the choir and the south wall of the south
transept. The cloister enclosure is still marked by a good wall, but of
the conventual buildings which formerly surrounded it, only the chapter
house and some vaulted cellars on the east side survive.
The existing ruins cover about an acre of ground, but formerly the
enclosure of the garden and orchard extended to twelve Scotch acres.
Little is known of the annals of the monastery. Its earliest charter is
by Robert I., granting the property of the abbey to be held as a free
barony, and this was confirmed by David II. At the Reformation the lands
were leased at a low rate to the Earl of Cassilis, who was created
[Illustration: FIG. 1054.--Glenluce Abbey. Plan.]
[Illustration: FIG. 1055.--Glenluce Abbey. Chapter House.]
[Illustration: FIG. 1056.--Glenluce Abbey. View from South-East.]
bailie of the abbey. In 1587 the estates were annexed to the Crown.
James VI. erected them into a temporal barony in favour of Laurence
Gordon, commendator at the time. The lordship of Glenluce afterwards
passed to the Stair family, and the lands to the Hays of Park.[77]
[Illustration: FIG. 1057.--Glenluce Abbey. Doorway to Chapter House:
Exterior.]
In this remote region the buildings remained long undisturbed, and as
late as 1646 the abbey is referred to in the Records of the Presbytery
of Stranraer as having received little injury.[78] “The steeple,” says
Symson, who wrote in 1684, “and part of the walls of the church,
together with the chapter house, the walls of the cloyster, the
gatehouse with the walls of the large precincts, are for the most part
yet standing.”
So far as can now be ascertained from the ruins, the church (see Fig.
1054) seems to have comprised a nave with aisles about 90 feet in
length,
[Illustration: FIG. 1058.--Glenluce Abbey. Doorway to Chapter House:
Interior.]
now entirely destroyed; a transept, of which part of the southern arm
with its eastern aisle or chapels remains; and an aisleless choir, of
which only a fragment of the south wall survives. From Symson’s
statement, above quoted, there was also a steeple, but whether over the
crossing or not does not now appear. To the south of the nave lay the
cloisters, the walls of which (partly old and partly reconstructed) now
subsist, and enclose a space measuring 89 feet from north to south by 86
feet from east to west. The north, west, and south sides are enclosed
with a stone wall, and on the east side there is a row of structures
comprising the chapter house in the centre, a ruined heap on the north
side of the chapter house, and two cellars with plain barrel vaults on
the south side.
The chapter house (Fig. 1055) is the only portion of the abbey in good
preservation. It consists of an apartment about 24 feet square, with a
central pillar, from which spring the ribs of the groined vaulting. At
the side walls the ribs rest on corbels. The apartment is lighted with
two traceried windows (Fig. 1056), the tracery of which has been renewed
within recent years, after the pattern of the old tracery. The door
enters from the cloister on the west. It is of semicircular form (Fig.
1057), and exhibits in its capitals some peculiar and striking
sculpture. The leaves of the foliage are large and the design is
remarkable, some of the leaves, which are probably intended to represent
sun flowers, having very much the appearance of starfish. The interior
of the chapter house doorway (Fig. 1058) has also some peculiar
sculpture, and the manner in which the ribs of the vaults descend on the
round arch-head is well managed.
[Illustration: FIG. 1059.--Glenluce Abbey.