ABSTRACT
Kirkstead Abbey is the type of place-name formation which scholars of place-names call 'appellative'. Apart from the fragment of the conventual church south transept, the only element of the monastic buildings of Kirkstead standing above ground today, is the little chapel of St Leonard. The fate of the monastery of Kirkstead and of its lands, then, is revealed by the field archaeology as the famous stud farm and stables of Henry VIII's sometime Master of Horse, the renowned huntsman and boon companion of the king in all displays of lordship. The Tattershall accounts for 1445–46 make it clear that the stream which emerges around here and flows into the embayment north of Kirkstead was dammed with a brick and masonry structure to create a pool called 'The Synker'. The Synker is likely to have played its role in the pleasures of this hunting landscape.
