For the buildings and precinct layout of Rievaulx Abbey, the primary sources are the ruins themselves, the earthworks that surround them, and the 4,000 or more objects recovered by excavation and clearance in the 1920s.
English Heritage holds the entire archaeological archive at its Archaeology Store at Helmsley. The National Monuments Record holds a substantial collection of photographs taken throughout the conservation and repair of the site.
The primary evidence for the abbey’s estate is found in a late 12th century cartulary now held in the British Library: Cotton MS Julius Dii, published in an edited version with later charters by J C Atkinson in 1889 (see published sources below).
Papers relating to the suppression are principally owned by the duke of Rutland and are in the muniment room at Belvoir Castle: Belvoir, MS Misc 105 (1) is a rental list of abbey lands at Griff and Newlathes Granges and within the precinct, while Belvoir, MS Misc 105 (4) is a rental list of lands in Bilsdale and Raisdale of 1539.
Additionally there is, at Belvoir Castle, an inventory of the site probably dating to the spring of 1539 (uncatalogued, but included in Atkinson’s publication of the cartulary, together with the grant of the site to the earl of Rutland: TNA, Patent Roll 30 Henry VIII, pt 7, m 2, and the Ministers’ Accounts of Michaelmas 1539).
All these documents (apart from Belvoir, MS Misc 105 (4)) were republished by Coppack in 1986 or 1999 (see below). Belvoir, MS 105 (4) has been transcribed by Coppack and a copy is held with the Rievaulx archive at the Helmsley Archaeology Store.
John Chessell Buckler’s unpublished manuscript of Cistercian Abbeys and many associated original drawings are held by the British Library: the manuscript is in three volumes: British Library, London, MS 27, 763–5. Additional Rievaulx drawings are included in British Library, London, Additional MS 36395 and Additional MS 36402.
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