Abbey of Cluny
Painting of Cluny Abbey before it was partially destroyed. Public domain.
View of Cluny Abbey through the entrance gate. Photo
Chris Walton.
Steps leading down into Cluny Abbey. Photo
Richard Peat.
Visitors walk along the now-absent nave of the abbey church.
Photo
Chris Walton.
Transept and apse of Cluny's abbey church. Photos
Richard Peat.
Buildings added to Cluny in the 18th century. Photo
Richard Peat.
13th-century cellar. Photo
entropie fatal.
The Flour Store, now used for concerts. Photo
Richard Peat.
Chestnut ceiling of 1257 in the flour store. Photo
Max Westby.The Abbey of Cluny (also known as Ancienne Abbaye) in Burgundy was the center of a major monastic reform movement in the Middle Ages. Its church was the largest Christian building in the world until the new St. Peter's Basilica was constructed in Rome in the 16th century.
One transept of the 12th-century abbey church remains, along with 15th-century abbots' residences and 18th-century convent buildings. The site also includes pleasant gardens and a museum with Romanesque artifacts from the Ancienne Abbaye.
Founded in 910, the Abbey at Cluny was the center of a monastic reform movement that would spread throughout Europe. The abbey was built on a forested hunting preserve donated by William I the Pious, duke of Aquitaine and count of Auvergne.
Unlike most monastic patrons, William relieved the monks of Cluny of all obligations to him except for their prayers for his soul. It was much more common for patrons to retain some proprietary interest in the abbey and they usually expected to install their relatives as abbots.
Thus Cluny was able to avoid the secular entanglements that plagued many other monasteries. Cluny answered to the Pope alone, and would come to develop very close ties with the papacy.
The Abbey of Cluny was founded by Benedictine monks who wished to observe closer adherence to the Benedictine rule. One distinction was their commitment to offer perpetual prayer, emphasizing liturgy and spiritual pursuits over labor and other monastic activities.
At Cluny the liturgy was extensive and beautiful in inspiring surroundings, reflecting the new personally-felt wave of piety of the 11th century. Monastic intercession appeared indispensable to achieving a state of grace, and lay rulers competed to be remembered in Cluny's endless prayers, inspiring the endowments in land and benefices that made other arts possible.
Another uniqueness of Cluny was in its administration. Before Cluny, most monasteries were autonomous and associated with others only informally. But when new monasteries were founded in the Cluniac tradition, these were designated "priories," not abbeys, and were accordingly overseen by a prior who reported to the abbot of Cluny. The abbot of Cluny made regular visits to these priories and the priors met at Cluny once a year.
This system worked well, and especially after the Pope decreed in 1016 that the privileges of Cluny also extended to subordinate houses, there was further incentive for Benedictine communities to join the Cluniac order. Around 1088, construction began on the third abbey church at Cluny, the one that still stands in part today. Financed by kings, for centuries it was the largest church in Christendom.
The early Cluniac establishments had offered refuges from a disordered world, but by the late 11th century Cluniac piety permeated society. This is the period that achieved the final Christianization of the heartland of Europe.
At its height of its influence in the 12th century, Cluny was at the head of a monastic "empire" of 10,000 monks. The abbots of Cluny were almost as powerful as popes, and four of them in fact became popes. In 1098, Pope Urban II (himself a Cluniac) declared that Cluny was the "light of the world."
Cluny's great success was due in large part to its abbots. The Abbey of Cluny was guided by an orderly succession of able and educated abbots drawn from the highest aristocratic circles, two of whom were canonized: Odo of Cluny, the second abbot (died 942) and Hugh of Cluny (died 1109). Odilo, the fifth abbot (died 1049), was a third great leader.
In the early 12th century, however, the order began to lose momentum under poor government. Cluny was subsequently revitalized under Abbot Peter the Venerable (d. 1156), who brought lax priories back into line and returned to stricter discipline. Cluny reached its last days of power and influence under Peter, as its monks became bishops, legates, and cardinals throughout France and the Holy Roman Empire.
But soon, newer and more austere orders such as the Cistercians were generating the next wave of ecclesiastical reform. At the same time, the rise of English and French nationalism created a climate unfavorable to the existence of monasteries autocratically ruled by a head residing in Burgundy.
The Papal Schism of 1378 to 1409 further divided loyalties: France recognized the pope at Avignon and England that at Rome, interfering with the relations between Cluny and its dependent houses in England. Under the strain, some English houses, such as Lenton Priory, Nottingham, became officially English, weakening the Cluniac structure.
By the time of the French Revolution, the monks of Cluny were so thoroughly identified with the Ancien Régime that the order was suppressed in France and the monastery at Cluny was partly demolished. The abbey was sold as national property and was used as a stone quarry. It was systematically dismantled until 1823.
Although most of the great Abbey of Cluny stands in ruins, the ruins still suggest the size and glory of the abbey at its zenith, and imagining it as it once was is part of the attraction.
The best place to start is the Porte d'Honneur, the entrance to the abbey from the village. Its classical architecture is reflected in the pilasters and Corinthian columns of the Clocher de l'Eau-Bénite (a majestic bell tower), crowning the only remaining part of the abbey church, the south transept.
Between the two is the reconstructed monumental staircase, which led to the portal of the abbey church, and the excavated column bases of the vast narthex. The entire nave is gone.
On one side of the transept is a national horse-breeding center (haras) founded in 1806 by Napoléon and constructed with materials from the destroyed abbey.
The other side is an elegant pavilion built as monastic cloisters in the 18th century. The gardens there once contained an ancient lime tree (destroyed by a 1982 storm) named after Abélard, the controversial French philosopher who sheltered at the abbey in 1142.
Off to the right is the 13th-century flour store, with its fine oak-and-chestnut roof and collection of exquisite Romanesque capitals from the vanished choir.
The Musée Ochier, in the abbatial palace, contains masterpieces of Romanesque sculptures. Remains of both the abbey and the village constructed around it are conserved here, as well as part of the Bibliothèque des Moines (Monks' Library).
Quick Facts
| Names: | Abbaye de Cluny; Ancienne Abbaye; Abbey of Cluny; Cluny Abbey; |
| Type of site: | Christian monastery |
| Faith: | Roman Catholic (Cluniac order) |
| Date: | Founded 910 |
| Architecture: | Romanesque |
| Status: | Ruins |
| Hours: | Sept.-Apr., daily 9:30-noon and 1:30-5; May-Aug., daily 9:30-6:30. |
| Cost: | €6.10 |
Map
Below is a location map and aerial view of Cluny Abbey. Using the buttons on the left, zoom in for a closer look or zoom out to get your bearings. Click and drag the map to move around. For a larger view, see our France Map or get our free Google Earth download.
- Abbaye de Cluny – Center of National Monuments
- Ancienne Abbaye, Cluny – Fodor's Online Travel Guide
- Congregation of Cluny – Catholic Encyclopedia
- Foundation Charter of Cluny, 910 - Medieval Sourcebook
