RT Article
T1 Fécamp, Cluny, and the Invention of Traditions in the Later Eleventh Century
JF The journal of medieval monastic studies
VO 5
SP 1
OP 41
A1 Pohl, Benjamin 1985-
A1 Vanderputten, Steven
LA English
PB Brepols
YR 2016
UL https://ixtheo.de/Record/1578019656
AB In 1001 Duke Richard II of Normandy appointed William of Dijon as the first abbot of La Trinité de Fécamp. 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 Fécamp 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 Fécamp 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.
DO 10.1484/J.JMMS.5.110837