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Abingdon's history is closely intertwined with that of its Abbey. Abingdon Abbey claimed to be the first monastery to be set up in Britain. A title strongly contested by Glastonbury, which was said to have been founded by St. Joseph of Arimathea in AD 63. A discredited legend says Abingdon's origins lie with the evangelists, SS. Medwy & Elfan, who Pope Eleutherius sent over to the Roman client-King, Lucius of the Catuvellauni, in AD 166.
Another tradition says that St. Helen herself later founded a church on the site of the present one dedicated to her memory. Her son, the Roman Emperor Constantine, gave her foundation one of the nails from the Holy Cross of the Crucifixion, which his mother had found in Jerusalem. St. Birinus later restored this Roman church, and it became a Saxon Minster, standing within a Royal estate. The Witan (Saxon parliament) is known to have met there in AD 989. St. Helen's is said to be the widest church in the country, having a nave and four huge 15th century aisles. The church's finest treasure is the beautiful painted ceiling of the Lady Chapel. Dated about 1391, its fifty-two panels feature Christ's ancestors (a Jesse Tree). The church contains the Mayor's seat, complete with sword-rest, and was home to the Fraternity of the Holy Cross. This was a kind of guild set up by King Henry VI in the early 1440s, and dedicated to the Holy Cross for obvious reasons. Behind St. Helen's stands the delightful Christ's Hospital (or Long Alley Almshouses) founded by the brotherhood a few years later. A charming wooden cloister walk was added in the 17th century. There are three further sets of almshouses nearby.
In the fifth century, the legendary St. Abban, the only man to escape the original Night of the Long Knives (when the Saxons massacred the British at a peace conference at Stonehenge) is said to have built himself a hermitage on Boar's Hill, just north of the town. In later years, it became deserted but was refounded, in AD 675, as a religious community by Prince Hean, the nephew of King Cissa of Upper Wessex. However, the stream on Abban's Down interfered with the church's foundations and Hean was forced to move his community down into the valley below: and he took the name, Abing-don, with him. Hean's was probably the true founding of the Abbey, the other stories being fanciful mythology.
During King Alfred the Great's reign, the Abbey was burnt to the ground by the Danes from Reading, and there was a small skirmish outside the town. A superb Saxon sword from this period was found in the Thames at Abingdon. It has a silver covered pommel decorated with foliage and leopard heads. Below, among fine interlace work are a man, an eagle, a lion and a cow: the symbols of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.
King Edgar the Peacemaker was educated at Abingdon Abbey by St. Aethelwold, the Abbot. The monastery was then in a very ruinous state and he promised that if he became King he would strive to restore all neglected churches.