Marmoutier Monastery (Tours)
The monastery of Marmoutier above the Loire near Tours was founded according to monastery tradition by St. Bishop Martin of Tours in 372/375, shortly after he became bishop in 371. Before that he had retired to the local caves as a hermit, after which a group of students had formed around him.
Around 420 the monk Sulpicius Severus died in the abbey , who reported to posterity, among other things, a dispute between St. Martin and Bishop Brictius of Tours . Brictius had been raised in the monastery by St. Martin and lived in the community of the monks. After he was ordained a priest, as part of the secular clergy of Tours, however, he no longer respected the monastic way of life, which Martin, as bishop, strongly criticized. Nevertheless, after Martin's death in 397, he succeeded him as bishop and built the first church in his honor at the gates of Tours.
In 852 Robert the Brave († 866), Count of Paris , lay abbot of the monastery. In 853 the monastery was devastated by the Normans .
In 860 the canons of St. Martin of Tours were able to establish themselves in Marmoutier. But they were replaced in 982 by monks from Cluny under Abbot Mayeul. In 996 Count Odo I of Chartres and Tours was buried in the abbey, who had released the monastery into the Cluniac association in the mid-980s.
Around 1044 Gaunilo, Count of Montigni, entered the Marmoutier monastery after several misfortunes during feuds, after he had left his wife and children. He conducted a written dispute with Anselm of Canterbury about his proof of God .
In 1096 the monastery received a new church and a sanctuary, further monastery buildings were built until 1312.
During the French Revolution , the buildings were used as a military hospital, after which the monastery began to be systematically dismantled. Of the original buildings, only the portal with the crosier, the prior's house and the curtain wall are preserved. Towards the hill, in the west of the curtain wall, you can see a large portal from the 18th century, directly in the axis of the entrance hall of the church.
The buildings now house a school and boarding school founded by Sophie Barat in 1847.
The Chapel of the Dormouse is a grotto in the hill to the west of the bell tower. The seven disciples of St. Martin, who are all said to have died on the same day, were buried here. The graves were carved out of the rock and destroyed in 1562; today they are empty.
Web links
- Institution Marmoutier (French)
literature
- Friedrich Wilhelm Bautz : GAUNILO, Benedictine. In: Biographisch-Bibliographisches Kirchenlexikon (BBKL). Volume 2, Bautz, Hamm 1990, ISBN 3-88309-032-8 , Sp. 187.
Coordinates: 47 ° 24 ′ 11 ″ N , 0 ° 43 ′ 1 ″ E