§ 63. THE MONKS OF CLUNY. 331
The convent of Cluny,1 located twelve miles northwest of Macon, France, stood at the height of its influence in the eleventh and twelfth centuries. Founded in 910 by Duke William of Aquitaine, and directed by a succession of wise abbots, it gained an eminence, second only to that of Monte Cassino among the monasteries of the West, and became the nursery of a monastic revival which spread over Europe from the Adriatic to Scotland.
No religious locality in the Latin church enjoyed a purer fame than Cluny. Four of its abbots, Odo, Majolus, Odilo, and Hugh, attained the dignity of canonized saints. Three popes were among its monks, Gregory VII.,2 Urban II., and Pascal II., and the antipope Anacletus II. Gelasius II., driven from Rome, 1118, took refuge within its walls and died there lying on ashes and there was buried. The car dinals who elected Calixtus II., his successor, met at Cluny. Kings joined with popes in doing it honor.
The Cluniacs re-enforced the rule of St. Benedict in the direction of greater austerity. In Lorraine and Germany the Cluny influence began to be felt after the monastic reform, led by such men as Abbot Gerhard of Brogue in the tenth century, had run its course.3 Such monastic leaders as William, abbot of St. Benignus at Dijon, Poppo, abbot of Stablo and Limburg, and William of Hirschau represented the Benedictine rule and were in full sympathy with Cluny. Hirschau in the Black Forest became a centre of Cluniac influence in Southern Germany and one of the chief centres of intelligence of the age.4 Its abbot William, 1069-91, a vigorous disciplinarian and reformer, had received a thorough scholastic training at the convent of St. Emmeram, Regensburg. He was in correspondence with Anselm and
1 The town now has four thousand inhabitants.
2 Hauck, III. 596, thinks there is no doubt Gregory was a Cluniac. 8 Hauck, III. 345 sqq.
4 A list of the German convents adopting the rule of Cluny, or a modified form of it, is given by Hauck, III. 863.
332 THE MIDDLE AGES. A.D. 1049-1294.
visited Gregory VII. in Rome about the year 1075. The convent became a Gregorian stronghold in the controversy over the right of investiture. With the rule of Cluny before him William, in 1077, drew up a similar code for Hirschau, known as the Constitutions 8 Hirsaugienses, and introduced the white dress of the Cluniacs which gave rise to the sneer that the monks were cleansing their garments instead of their hearts.1 Under William the Conqueror the Cluniacs established themselves in England at Barnstaple. William thought so well of them that he offered to one of their num ber, Hugh, the supervision of the religious affairs of the realm. The second house in England was the important establishment, St. Pancras at Lewes, set up by Gundrada and the Earl of Warren, the Conqueror's son-in-law, 1077. 2 Bermonclsey, Wenlock, and Thetford were other important houses. The Cluniac houses in England were called priories and their heads priors or deans.3 Hugo, who held the position of abbot of Cluny for sixty years, 1048-1109, was the friend of Gregory VII. and during his administration Cluny was visited by Urban II., one of Hugo's disciples, after the adjournment of the synod of Clermont. Hugo began the erection of the great basilica in 1089, which was dedicated by Innocent II. in 1131. It was the next greatest church after St. Peter's in the West.
Under Pontius, the seventh abbot, 1109-22, the current of
1 William erected new buildings at Hirschau to accommodate the large accessions of monks and founded a scriptorium and a library. Among his writings was a work on music, de musica et tonis. Hirschau was turned into a Protestant school by Duke Christoph, 1556. Its buildings were destroyed by the army of Louis XIV. The ruins are among the most ven erable monuments of Wiirttemberg.
2 Gundrada had visited Cluny. On her tombstone was placed the inscrip tion Intulit eccl<jsiis Anglorum balsama moritrn, " She brought the balm of good manners to the churches of England. " See Stephens, p. 254.
3 When the monasteries were repressed by Henry VIII., there were thirty-two Cluniac houses in England. Gasquet, 218. Taunton, I. 27, speaks of thirty-eight houses and three hospitals in London belonging to the Cluniacs.