A COMMUNITY of Benedictine nuns and monks is to sell its historic home in Burford , with a guide price of £6.5m.

Burford Priory is a grade I-listed building, sitting in 16 acres of gardens. Nuns and monks have lived within the priory walls, only yards from the busy centre of Burford , since 1949.

Now it will make the perfect home for anyone looking for a Jacobean mansion with its own chapel and gardens with sweeping views over the Windrush Valley.

The nuns arrived first in 1949, when the Society of the Salutation of Mary the Virgin, a community of Anglican nuns, bought the priory.

But by the 1980s, its numbers had dwindled from about 20 to just six, with the small group of ageing sisters struggling with the work required to keep the large manor house and its extensive gardens going.

So, in 1987, they were joined by a small community of monks who arrived to embrace the simplicity of Benedictine life.

Abbot Stuart Burns said: "This has been a long and careful decision for our community to make. But the decision marks a new chapter in our history and we are looking forward to welcoming visitors to our new home in the very near future."

It is understood the community will be seeking a new home within 100 miles of Burford .

But it is unlikely to match the priory for splendour or history.

It is referred to in documents dating back to 1226, when it was given to the Hospital of St John the Evangelist by Henry III.

At the time of the Dissolution of the Monasteries, the building was granted by Henry VIII to his barber surgeon, Edmund Harman.

Other owners have included the Cary family of Great Tew, and William Lenthall, the great Commons speaker in the Long Parliament who was a reluctant signatory of Charles I's death warrant.

Visitors have included James I, Charles II and William III.

Damian Gray, of agent Knight Frank, said: "Usually, including visitors, there are about 12 people living at the priory. It is not a question of the community wanting to find somewhere smaller.

"They are just looking to the future and are ready to recreate their monastic life somewhere else. The nuns and monks are looking to remain together as a mixed community."

Burford Priory consists of three properties. The grade I-listed house is largely Jacobean in style and has a great variety of architectural features, including arched windows and ornate stone crenellations, cornices and parapet walls. The house contains 22 bedrooms, Joined to the priory by an ornate link is the Chapel of St John, a grade II-listed building. To the east is the Old Rectory, a 17th-century former parsonage house, and a cottage.

Many of the sisters who spent their last years in Burford are buried in a small graveyard in the grounds.