Fécamp, Cluny, and the Invention of Traditions in the Later Eleventh Century

Abstract

In 1001 Duke Richard II of Normandy appointed William of Dijon as the first abbot of La Trinite de Fecamp. Together with his patron, William initiated a programme of monastic reform which scholarship has long seen as a deliberate imitation of Cluniac custom. This equation has been based on a corpus of early Norman charters that are widely held to have exempted Fecamp from Rouen’s episcopal authority as early as 1006, explicitly evoking Cluny in an attempt to abolish the bishop’s rights in the election and blessing of abbots. Following a comprehensive reassessment of the historical and diplomatic evidence, this article argues that Cluny did not become a model for Fecamp before the second half of the eleventh century. It questions notions of continuity by demonstrating that both the charters and the traditions to which they pertain are in fact later eleventh-century inventions, which medieval forgers and modern readers alike have projected back onto earlier periods.