Newstead Abbey is the ancestral home of which poet?
Newstead Abbey and houses a museum containing Byron memorabilia. Newstead Abbey Newstead Abbey, in Nottinghamshire, England, was formerly an Augustinian priory. Converted to a domestic home following the Dissolution of the Monasteries, it is now best known as the ancestral home of Lord Byron. The priory of St. Mary of Newstead, a house of Augustinian Canons, was founded by King Henry II of England about the year 1170, as one of many penances he paid following the murder of Thomas Becket. Contrary to its current name, Newstead was never an abbey: it was a priory. In the late 13th century, the priory
Newstead Abbey Abbey and its contents, restoring it to some greatness. The architect John Shaw Sr. designed new parts of the abbey for Wildman. <nowiki> In 1861,</nowiki> William Frederick Webb, African <nowiki>explorer, bought the Abbey from Wildman's widow. Under Webb, the chapel was redecorated, but the rest of the house remained largely unaltered. After his death in 1899, the estate passed to each of his surviving children and finally to his grandson Charles Ian Fraser. Fraser sold Newstead to local philanthropist, Sir</nowiki> Julien Cahn, <nowiki>who presented it to Nottingham Corporation in 1931.</nowiki> The Abbey is now publicly owned, by Nottingham City Council,