Culross Abbey

Culross Abbey is a former Cistercian abbey in Culross, Scotland, headed by the Abbot or Commendator of Culross. Part of it is still used as the local parish church by the Church of Scotland.

The abbey was founded in 1217 by Malcolm I, Mormaer or Earl of Fife, and was first colonised by monks from Kinloss Abbey. Culross may have been chosen to establish an abbey because this was the birthplace of Saint Mungo. It is evident that the abbey was built over the earlier Pictish church supposedly founded by Saint Serf in the 6th century, as witnessed by the presence in the ruined Cistercian church of early medieval carved stones and from a ninth-century reference to a church of St Serf at Culross in a Gaelic list of the mothers of various saints.

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