Archaeologia Cantiana Vol. 88 1973 page 129

The remains of the Cistercian Abbey of Boxley, founded in 1146, lie at the foot of the North Downs less than two miles from Maidstone (N.G.R. TQ 761587). Apart from the extensive late-thirteenth-century barn, plainly visible from the motorway (M20), what survives of the medieval buildings is not impressive and, for the most part, architecturally featureless. Covering the site of the south end of the west range is a house of eighteenth-century appearance which on close inspection is revealed to contain traces of medieval and post-Dissolution Tudor construction, while gardens to the north and east are enclosed by stone rubble walls standing-in more or less rebuilt condition-on the lines of the medieval nave and south claustral buildings. The eastern limb of the church with its transepts, the chapter house and eastern range, together with the greater part of the west range, are represented only by footings buried well below the lawns and flower beds. In previous times attempts have been made to interpret these scanty remains and to supply additional information by excavation. George Payne traced the general lines of the presbytery and transepts in 1897-8 but unfortunately he seems to have left no plan or other adequate record of what he found.¹ Working on what could be deduced about		Payne's digging, and relating this to the standing remains, a tentative reconstruction was produced by A. W. Clapham and F. C. Elliston-Erwood in 1926. This, with subsequent modifications, was published by Elliston-Erwood in Arch. Cant., lxvi (1953), where an admission was made that the plan was intended to serve only until 'a new generation of archaeologists, according to ancient custom, proceed to indicate how and where their predecessors erred'. It is very gratifying, however, to admirers of this eminent late member of our Society, to record that our recent investigations have proved his reconstruction substantially correct except for details which could not possibly have been deduced from the evidence then available. In 1971-2 the Kent Archaeological Society undertook a programme of selective excavation with the limited object of establishing the general plan of the church and claustral buildings. In this we were actively encouraged by the present owner of Boxley Abbey, our member Sir John Best-Shaw, who allowed us the liberty of opening trenches in the lawns and other parts of the gardens to locate buried footings. ¹ Payne described the results of his work to members of the Kent Archaeological Society on 31st July, 1901. Arch. Cant., xxv (1902), liii-liv.
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