Carmarthen Priory
priory in Carmarthen

Carmarthen Priory (also known as St John's Priory or Priory of St John and St Teulyddog) was a religious site in Carmarthen, South Wales. It has now virtually disappeared. The Black Book of Carmarthen, an early Welsh-language text, is believed to have been created at the Priory.
History
Celtic monastery
A Celtic monastic settlement existed at Carmarthen prior to the Norman Conquest. It was called Llandeulyddog and was the church of Saint Teulyddog. This is likely the same church as Llan Teulydawc, one of the Seven Bishop-Houses of the Kingdom of Dyfed, and may date back to the 6th century.
Benedictine monastery
Following the establishment of a royal castle at Carmarthen in 1109, the newly built St Peter's Church and the older church at Llandeulyddog were placed under the jurisdiction of Battle Abbey by Henry I. A Benedictine monastery was established on the site in c. 1110.
Augustinian priory
In 1125, ownership reverted to Bishop Bernard of St Davids, who established an Augustinian priory on the site dedicated to St John the Evangelist and the Celtic saint Teulyddog.
In 1208, William de Londres (a Norman lord and one of the Twelve Knights of Glamorgan) attempted to take over the Priory.
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This entry incorporates text from “Carmarthen Priory” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.