Cluny or Clugny

CLUNY or CLUGNY, a town of east central France, in the department of Saone-et-Loire, on the left bank of the Grosne, 14 m. N.W. of Mâcon. Pop. (1931) 3,008. The interest of the town lies in its specimens of mediaeval architecture, which include, be sides its celebrated abbey, the Gothic church of Notre-Dame, the church of St. Marcel with its beautiful Romanesque spire, portions of the ancient fortifications and a number of old houses. Cluny gradually increased in importance with the founding of the abbey (910) and the development of the religious fraternity, and in 1090 received a communal charter from the abbot St. Hugh. In 1471 the town was taken by the troops of Louis XI. In 1529 the abbey was given "in commendam" to the family of Guise. The town and abbey suffered during the Wars of Religion of the 16th cen tury, and the abbey was closed in 179o.

The chief remains of the abbey are the ruins of the basilica of St. Peter and the abbot's palace. The church was a Romanesque building, completed early in the 12th century, and until the erec tion of St. Peter at Rome was the largest ecclesiastical building in Europe. It was in great part demolished under the First Empire, but the south transept, a high octagonal tower, the chapel of Bourbon (15th century), and the ruins of the apse still remain. In 1750 the abbey buildings were largely rebuilt. The abbot's palace (15th century) serves as hotel-de-ville, library and mu seum. The town has quarries of limestone and building-stone, and manufactures pottery, leather and paper.

The Order of Cluniac Benedictines.

The Monastery of Cluny was founded in 910 by William I. the Pious, count of Auvergne and duke of Guienne (Aquitaine). The first abbot was Berno, who had under his rule two monasteries in the neighbour hood. Before his death in 927 two or three more came under his control, so that he bequeathed to his successor the government of a little group of five or six houses, which became the nucleus of the order of Cluny. Berno's successor was Odo : armed with papal privileges he set to work to make Cluny the centre of a revival and reform among the monasteries of France; he also journeyed to Italy, and induced some of the great Benedictine houses (see BENEDICTINES), and among them St. Benedict's own monasteries of Subiaco and Monte Cassino, to receive the reform and adopt the Cluny manner of life. The process of extension, partly by founding new houses, partly by incorporating old ones, went on under Odo's successors, so that by the middle of the 12th century Cluny had become the centre and head of a great order embrac ing 314 monasteries—the number 2,000, sometimes given, is an exaggeration—in all parts of Europe, in France, Italy, the Empire, Lorraine, Spain, England, Scotland, Poland, and even in the Holy Land. And the influence of Cluny extended far beyond the actual order : many monasteries besides Monte Cassino and Subiaco adopted its customs and manner of life without subjecting them selves to its sway. Fleury and Hirsau may be mentioned as con spicuous examples.

If its influence on the subsequent history of monastic and religious life and organization be considered, the most noteworthy feature of the Cluny system was its external polity, which consti tuted it a veritable "order" in the modern sense of the word, the first that had existed since that of Pachomius (see MoNASTI clsM). All the houses that belonged, either by foundation or incor poration, to the Cluny system were absolutely subject to Cluny and its abbot, who was "general" in the same sense as the general of the Jesuits or Dominicans, the practically absolute ruler of the whole system. The superiors of all the subject houses (usually priors, not abbots) were his nominees; every member of the order was professed by his permission, and had to pass some of the early years of his monastic life at Cluny itself ; the abbot of Cluny had entire control over every one of the monks—some io,000, it is said ; it even came about that he had the practical appointment of his successor. For a description and criticism of the system, see F. A. Gasquet, Sketch of Monastic Constitutional History, pp. xxxii.–xxxv. (the Introduction to 2nd ed. [ 1895] of the English trans. of the Monks of the West); here it must suffice to say that it is the very antithesis of the Benedictine polity.

The greatness of Cluny is really the greatness of its early abbots. If the short reign of the unworthy Pontius be excepted, Cluny was ruled during a period of about 2 50 years (910-1157) by a succession of seven great abbots, who combined those high qualities of character, ability and religion that were necessary for so commanding a position; they were Berno, Odo, Aymard, Majolus (Maieul), Odilo, Hugh, Peter the Venerable. Sprung from noble families of the neighbourhood ; educated to the highest level of the culture of those times; taking part in all great move ments of ecclesiastical and temporal politics; refusing the first sees in Western Christendom, the cardinalate, and the papacy itself, they ever remained true to their state as monks, without loss of piety or religion. Four of them, indeed, Odo, Maieul, Odilo and Hugh, are venerated as saints.

In the movement associated with the name of Hildebrand the influence of Cluny was thrown strongly on the side of religious and ecclesiastical reform, as in the suppression of simony and the enforcing of clerical celibacy ; but in the struggle between the papacy and the Empire the abbots of Cluny seem to have exer cised a moderating influence. Hildebrand himself, though probably not a monk of Cluny, was a monk of a Cluniac monastery in Rome; his successor, Urban II., was actually a Cluny monk, as was Paschal II. It may safely be said that from the middle of the Loth century until the middle of the 12th, Cluny was the chief centre of religious influence throughout Western Europe, and the abbot of Cluny, next to the pope, the most important and powerful ecclesiastic in the Latin Church.

During the abbacy of Peter the Venerable (I '22-1157)it became clear that, after a lapse of two centuries, a renewal of the framework of the life and a revival of its spirit had become necessary. Accordingly he summoned a great chapter of the whole order whereat the priors and representatives of the subject houses attended in such numbers that, along with the Cluny com munity, the assembly consisted of 1,200 monks. This chapter drew up the 7b statutes associated with Peter's name, regulating the whole range of claustral life, and solemnly promulgated as binding on the whole Cluniac obedience. But these measures did not succeed in saving Cluny from a rapid decline that set in imme diately after Peter's death. The rise of the Cistercians and the mendicant orders were contributory causes, and also the difficul ties experienced in keeping houses in other countries subject to a French superior. And so the great system gradually became a mere congregation of French houses, which was dissolved in 179o.

Cluniac houses were introduced into England under the Con queror. The first foundation was at Barnstaple; the second at Lewes by William de Warenne, in 1077, and it counted as one of the "Five Daughters of Cluny." Though the bonds with Cluny seem to have been much relaxed if not wholly broken, the Clu niac houses continued as a separate group up to the dissolution, never taking part in the chapters of the English Benedictines. Abridged accounts, with references to the most recent literature, may be found in Heimbucher, Orden and Kongregationen (1896), i. § 20; Herzog-Hauck, Realencyklopadie (ed. 3), art. "Cluni" (Grutz macher) ; and the Catholic Encyclopaedia, art. "Cluny" (Seckur) ; Die Cluniacenser (1891-1894) . An account is given in Maitland, Dark Ages, §§ xviii.—xxvi. The story of the English houses is briefly sketched in the second chapter of F. A. Gasquet's Henry V111. and the English Monasteries (the larger ed., i886) ; see also the same writer's English Monastic Life.