BUILDINGS 25

opposite the Castle, seems, from the few odd frag-
ments of stone that remain, to have had fine build-
ings. The Augustinian Friary was between Lendal
and the river. The Dominican house, which was
burnt down in 1455, was "on the site of the old
railway station.

The only nunnery in the city was the Benedictine
Priory of St. Clement. There were sisterhoods in
St. Leonard's and other hospitals. It should,
however, be noted there were many nunneries in
the districts round York.

Some of the religious institutions were called
Hospitals. The care of the sick was only one of the
functions of this type of religious house. Such was
the large and famous St. Leonard's Hospital, a royal
institution that was not under the control of a
bishop. The beautiful ruins of St. Leonard's, which
adjoined St. Mary's Abbe}-, prove how well this
hospital had been built. These hospitals, of which
there were fifteen in York, were in close touch with
the people. While St. Mary's, for instance, was
one of the great abbeys, where the monks, by the time
when the fifteenth century was advanced, w^ere living
luxuriously, easily, and generally unproductively,
the religious of the hospitals and lesser houses, were
still engaged in feeding the poor, tending the sick,
and educating the children of the people.

Each of these religious institutions, whether
monastery or hospital, was within its own grounds,
bounded by its own walls. Altogether they occupied
a large part of the total area of the mediaeval city
which their buildings adorned, and of which they
wrere so characteristic a feature : St. Mary's Abbey,
which with its buildings and grounds covered a
large area, was actually outside the city proper, but
it was immediately adjoining it. There were nearly