This sort of parish began to emerge in Anglo-Saxon England during the tenth century and was firmly in place by the Conquest – at Domesday it could be assumed that each village would have a priest who could lead the jury which attested to the landholding in the area.

Throughout the Anglo-Saxon period, the most important churches were ‘minsters’. ‘Minster’ is the modern scholarly translation of the Old English word mynster and its Latin equivalent monasterium. The most comprehensive definition is provided by John Blair in his introduction to The Church in Anglo-Saxon Society (OUP 2005):

“A complex ecclesiastical settlement which is headed by an abbess, abbot or man in priest’s orders; which contains nuns, monks, priests, or laity in a variety of possible combination, and is united to a greater or lesser extent by their liturgy and devotions; which may perform or supervise pastoral care to the laity, perhaps receiving dues and exerting parochial authority; and which may sometimes act as a bishop’s seat, while not depending for its existence or importance on that function.”

In other words, a ‘minster’ was a church building endowed with land, which supported a group of clergy who performed regular services there and were generally responsible for the spiritual needs of the area. The closest modern equivalent is probably a cathedral with its dean and canons, supported by a staff of vergers, cleaners, craftsmen and administrators – the system is a direct descendant of the Anglo-Saxon minster.

The history and concept of Minsters is expanded further in the two pdf documents linked below, each of which below opens a PDF file in a new window.