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History - After the Dissolution
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History - After the dissolution

The abbey buildings stood empty but undamaged for a few months because a paper scheme existed to make them the cathedral of a new bishopric with jurisdiction over Richmondshire and parts of Lancashire. In the event this honour went to the old Benedictine abbey of Chester, and by 1540 glass and lead from the dismantling of Fountains was finding its way into Ripon and York.

The buildings and part of the estates were sold by the king to Sir Richard Gresham in October 1540, and in 1597 the Greshams sold the abbey to Stephen Proctor, son of an early ironmaster. He was later knighted, and built Fountains Hall with stone from the abbey in 1611. After Proctor's death the abbey passed through several hands, coming eventually to the Messenger family who held it until 1768 when it was bought by William Aislabie and incorporated in the ornamental grounds of Studley Royal that had been begun as early as 1717 by his father John Aislabie, Chancellor of the Exchequer. Aislabie landscaped the surroundings of the abbey, cleared parts of the ruins of debris, and built picturesque additions to them that were mostly removed in the following century.

After Aislabie's death in 1781 the estate was held hrst by his daughter and then by her niece, and during this time the chapter house was excavated by John Martin of Ripon in 1790-1 and repairs were done to the church and the west range in 1822 and 1840. In 1845 the Earl de Grey, descendant of an earlier Aislabie, inherited the property. During his ownership the infirmary and the church were excavated by the Ripon antiquary, John Richard Walbran. Further excavations were carried out by W. H. St. J. Hope (later Sir William) in 1887-8 during the ownership of the first Marquis of Ripon.

In 1909 the estate passed to the second Marquis, and on his death in 1923 to Commander C. G. Vyner who continued the tradition of essential repairs to the ruins and cleared parts of the silted bed of the Skell within the abbey. In 1966 the nucleus of the Studley Royal estate was bought by the County Council of the West Riding of Yorkshire, which placed the abbey in the guardianship of the Minister of Public Building and Works.

 
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