In the British county of Yorkshire, near the city of Whitby, there are the ruins of one of the most interesting and mystical places in Britain - the old Whitby Abbey.
The legendary monastery was built around 657. At first, both men and women lived in the abbey, but later this place turned into a purely male monastery.
The first abbey of the abbey was the nun Hilda (she was later canonized). She is the protagonist of the myths and legends associated with this place. For example, it is believed that she saved the inhabitants of the surrounding villages from the penetration of snakes and turned reptiles into stones. Therefore, Whitby Abbey is often called the "monastery of stone snakes": in the area there are many petrified spiral bowls that resemble snake rings.
The abbey was devastated and abandoned by the British during the reign of Henry VIII, and finally destroyed by bombing during the First World War.
Now you can only see the ruins of the once magnificent buildings and the old eerie cemetery, whose tombstones are from 667 to 865 years old.
Whitby Abbey is considered a habitat for spirits and is surrounded by eerie legends. One of the stories says that the first abbess of the monastery, who saved this place from snakes, ended her days very badly. According to legend, she broke her vow of celibacy and was walled up alive in one of the walls of the monastery. Since then, her spirit has wandered around the Whitby ruins, frightening both locals and curious tourists.
Another myth tells that the famous Dracula once lived in Whitby Abbey. Bram Stoker, inspired by the ruins of an old monastery and this legend, described the abbey in his book Count Dracula and made it a place to turn a vampire into an evil dog.
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Local legends also say that one can hear the ringing of bells in the evening and at night (which have not been here for many decades) and meet hundreds of ghosts wandering between the gravestones in the old cemetery.