Byland Abbey can be found in a Yorkshire valley around eight miles east of Thrisk and a couple of miles north east of the village of Coxwold. Byland is the daughter house of Furness Abbey. In 1134 twelve monks and their principal Abbot Gerold left Furness to colonise a new abbey. At first they went to Calder and started to build a new abbey there, but in 1138 the abbey was attacked by the Scots forcing the monks to flee. They found refuge under the protection of the mother of Roger de Mowbray who found a place for them in Hood in North Yorkshire. Soon after they moved to Old Byland near to the Cistercian abbey of Rievaulx. Both Rievaulx and Furness Abbeys tried to claim jurisdiction over the Byland monks and so once again they moved to a new site at Stocking. This was thier home for the next thirty years. In 1177 the monks had amassed enough funds to start construction of a new abbey at Byland, its current location, safely under the control of Roger de Mowbray and by 1197 building work was complete.