The abbey [of Fountevrault] had come into being almost by accident. Towards the end of the eleventh century a wandering preacher from Britanny, Robert of Arbrissel, established a little community on a patch of land near a fountain – i.e. Fontevrault – building huts and a chapel. Men and women lived apart, the former cultivating the land, the latter leading a life of contemplative prayer. Meanwhile Robert himself continued his wandering and preaching, mainly in Anjou and Poitou. His chief concern was to be ‘abo all a guide and a comfort to all who were desolate or who had gone astray’, according to his earliest biographer, Baudry of Bourgueil.
Robert was such an attractive personality and his sermons were so inspiring that he drew more and more people to his community, especially ‘the poor, the sick, the incestuous, concubines, lepers, the weak and the aged’. It was a time when many new monastic orders were emerging. What made Fontevrault unusual was the number of women who joined it.
Robert did not care where they came from. At Rouen he converted an entire brothel whose inmates followed him home. So large did his community become that he had to divide it, setting up other settlements. Fontevrault itself contained 300 women, as well as the men. Robert found many rich benefactors and was therefore able to build a great abbey at Fontevrault and dependent priories. He gave his flock a rule based on that of St Benedict, but with startling innovations. Each house was to be a double community of men and women – monks, lay brethren and nuns – although Robert regarded the latter as the most important. The head of the new order was to be a nun, the abbess of Fontevrault. She had to be a widow, because widows were both chaste and maternal and were accustomed to handling property. The heads of the priories were also to be nuns. The rule made the monks and lay brothers completely subject to the abbess and her prioresses.
When Robert lay dying in 1116 he said: ‘What I have built, I built for the sake of the nuns. I gave everything for them – my life, my ministry and my disciples.’
He wanted to help all female victims of society, especially those who had been ill treated by men.
Source:
Seward, Desmond. “Fountevrault.” Eleanor of Aquitaine. New York: Times , 1979. 197-98. Print.
Further Reading:
The Royal Abbey of Our Lady of Fontevraud or Fontevrault (in French: abbaye deFontevraud)
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