Church and State in Mediaeval Germany. I

Abstract

The abbey of Cluny, from whose ascetic precincts the movement was destined to come forth to overturn the world, had a humble beginning. In 91o William, count of Auvergne and duke of Aquitaine, for the safety of his soul deeded to Berno,' abbot of Beaume and Gigny, a small tract located on the borders of the little river Grosne in the county of Macon, in the midst of the hills which marked the watershed between the Loire and the Sa6ne, whence in clear weather one might descry the blue ridge of the Jura. No spot was more central to Christian Europe, for it was accessible to the Alpine passes into Italy over which ran the pilgrimage roads to Rome, and on the edge between Germany and France in proximity to the future broad commercial highway which was soon to develop through mid-Europe via the Sa6ne and the Meuse rivers. The territory was neither French nor imperial, but part of the middle kingdom of Burgundy. At the time of its foundation Cluny was in a secluded and forested spot. The original group of Cluniacs was made up of six monks from Beaume and six from Gigny.2 After seventeen years of rule Berno gave way to Odo, a young noble, a native of the county of Maine, who had for some years been in the service of William of Aquitaine and had then abruptly renounced the world and come to Cluny.3 With him the energetic and expansive history of Cluny really begins. He was the first of a long list of abbotsall of noble blood-remarkable for their moral force and admini-