Fleury Abbey

Fleury Abbey (Floriacum) in Saint-Benoît-sur-Loire, Loiret, France, founded in about 640,[1] is one of the most celebrated Benedictine monasteries of Western Europe, and possesses the relics of St. Benedict of Nursia.

Its site on the banks of the Loire has always made it easily accessible from Orléans, a center of culture unbroken since Roman times.

The seventeenth-century Benedictine scholar Jean Mabillon accepted the traditional founding of Fleury as by Leodebaldus, abbot of St-Aignan (Orléans) about 640, in the existing Gallo-Roman villa of Floriacum, in the Vallis Aurea, the "Golden Valley".

The monastery enjoyed the patronage of the Carolingian dynasty for generations; it was also central to the political ambitions of the Robertian house descended from Robert I of France, several of whom had held the title Duke of the Franks.

The monk of Fleury named Helgaud (died ca 1068), was chaplain to King Robert II and wrote a brief Epitoma vitae Roberti regis.

By the mid-ninth century its library was one of the most comprehensive ever assembled in the West, and scholars such as Lupus of Ferrières (d. 862) traveled there to consult its texts.

Nevertheless, a Benedictine presence remained continually: the parish was held by a monk disguised as a secular priest, and there were numerous attempts to restore the monastery throughout the 19th century.

Mommolus, the second Abbot of Fleury, is said to have effected their transfer when that abbey fell into decay after the ravages of the Lombards in the sixth century.