Sawley Abbey was an abbey of Cistercian monks in the village of Sawley, Lancashire, in England (and historically in the West Riding of Yorkshire). Created as a daughter-house of Newminster Abbey, it existed from 1149 until its dissolution in 1536, during the reign of King Henry VIII. The abbey is a Grade I listed building and Scheduled Ancient Monument. The ruins, which are now controlled by English Heritage, are open to the public. Although not an extensive ruin, there are boards on the site that give information regarding the history of the abbey and its former inhabitants. History Created as a daughter-house of Newminster Abbey, itself a daughter of Fountains Abbey. The chief sponsor of the new abbey was William de Percy II, the son of Alan de Percy, feudal baron of Topcliffe, whose family had controlled the land in this part of Craven since Domesday. In the mid-1140s, Swain, son of Swain, agreed to sell his lease on the site of the new abbey to Abbot Robert of Newminster, also adding a gift of land and wood at Swanside where a fountain (spring) dedicated to St Andrew is mentioned. Percy granted additional lands in the local area for the maintenance of the brethren at Dudland in Gisburn and Ellenthorpe in Paythorne, also confirming gifts from a tenant at Rimington and his steward at Ilkley. Shortly after he augmented this grant, adding Crooks House in Bracewell and Brogden and Stainton in Bank Newton. Percy had funded the construction of several wooden buildings, and Abbot Benedict along with twelve monks and ten conversi relocated from Newminster, with the abbey officially opening on January 6, 1147-8. Permission to build a fishpond and a mill were confirmed in 1154 by Roger de Pont L'Évêque, Archbishop of York and King Stephen. Pope Alexander III officially took the abbey under his protection in 1172. William's younger daughter Matilda, the wife of William de Beaumont, 3rd Earl of Warwick gave Tadcaster hospital and land in Catton to the abbey, before the earl's death on crusade in 1184. The abbey struggled to survive with climactic conditions leading to crop failure, and the widowed Matilda was key to the abbey's re-foundation in 1189. She granted to the monks St Mary's Church, Tadcaster with the chapel at Hazlewood Castle, and an annual pension from the chapel at Newton Kyme, more land at Catton, along with grazing rights and the