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Shortly after the Norman conquest, a monk called Benedict (or Benoit) experienced a vision in Auxerre Abbey and received instructions from Saint Germain to go to Selby and build an abbey there. He arrived in Selby with the dried finger of St. Germain in about 1069 and obtained a charter from William the Conqueror to build the abbey and monastery. The earliest parts of the stone building now present were built by Benedict's successor Abbot Hugh to replace Benedict's original wooden one which stood on nearby Church Hill. The abbey church survived as a parish church after 1539 when most of the other buildings were demolished or fell into ruin after Henry VIII's dissolution of the monasteries.