THE south transept of the church is the northeastern termination of the east walk of the cloister. Immediately south of it, in the normal Cistercian plan, is the library. In most other Orders the position is occupied by the slype, though this may be placed further south. The slype was a passage leading from the cloister to the cemetery. It was also the inner parlour, or talking place. At one time conversation was forbidden in the cloister, but Lanfranc allowed it at certain times and on certain days: at other times the monks had to obtain leave to go to the parlour. At St Augustine's, Canterbury, there was a restriction as to subjects of talk in the cloister:

At Durham, just before the Dissolution, the parlour was also “a place for marchaunts to utter ther waires.” This reveals a sad declension from monastic fervour. Even if we suppose the merchants came to the parlour through the cemetery, and not through the private cloister, we wonder at their being allowed at all, when, according to the Rule, a monk had of his own “absolutely not anything: neither a book, nor tablets, nor a pen—nothing at all.” As early as the end of the twelfth century we find private property being owned by individual monks.