Dragsmark Abbey Ruin

Bohuslän · Sweden · Monastery

The ballad of fair Valborg was sung across Bohuslän: when she could not have her knight Axel she went in behind these cloister walls and never came out.

To Dragsmark belongs one of Bohuslän's most widespread stories: the ballad of the knight Axel Tordsson and fair Valborg Ingemarsdotter, a couple parted by the laws of the church, where she at last takes refuge behind the cloister walls — and stays there. The ballad was widely known in the district by the eighteenth century and was later dramatised by the Danish poet Oehlenschläger. The abbey was founded around 1234 by the Norwegian king Håkon Håkonsson in a valley inland of the Gullmar fjord, and the Premonstratensians ran a school for noble youths here for a time. It was secularised in 1532. In the seventeenth century the buildings were systematically demolished to supply stone for the building of Bohus fortress, and in 1846 the last remains of the abbey church collapsed. Broken walls stand in the grass, in a valley that is still completely silent.

FAQ

Where is Dragsmark Abbey Ruin located?

Dragsmark Abbey Ruin is in Bohuslän, Sweden.

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Accounts are drawn from local folklore and visitor reports.