[2] The deed of gift included vineyards, fields, meadows, woods, waters, mills, serfs, and lands both cultivated and uncultivated.

[3] It was stipulated that the monastery would be free from local authorities, lay or ecclesiastical, and subject only to the Pope, with the proviso that even he could not seize the property, divide or give it to someone else or appoint an abbot without the consent of the monks.

In donating his hunting preserve in the forests of Burgundy, William released Cluny Abbey from all future obligations to him and his family other than prayer.

William appears to have made this arrangement with Berno, the first abbot, to free the new monastery from such secular entanglements and initiate the Cluniac Reforms.

Soon, Cluny began to receive bequests from around Europe – from the Holy Roman Empire to the Spanish kingdoms from southern England to Italy.

[4][5] The reforms introduced at Cluny were in some measure traceable to the influence of Benedict of Aniane, who had put forward his new ideas at the first great meeting of the abbots of the order held at Aachen (Aix-la-Chapelle) in 817.

It was subsequently revitalized under Abbot Peter the Venerable (died 1156), who brought lax priories back into line and returned to stricter discipline.

Cluny reached its apogee of power and influence under Peter, as its monks became bishops, legates, and cardinals throughout France and the Holy Roman Empire.

Outside monastic structures, the rise of English and French nationalism created a climate unfavourable to the existence of monasteries autocratically ruled by a head residing in Burgundy.

The Papal Schism of 1378 to 1409 further divided loyalties: France recognizing a pope at Avignon and England one at Rome, interfered with the relations between Cluny and its dependent houses.

By the time of the French Revolution, revolutionary hatred of the Catholic Church led to the suppression of the order in France in 1790 and the monastery at Cluny was almost totally demolished in 1810.

When in 1016 Pope Benedict VIII decreed that the privileges of Cluny be extended to subordinate houses, there was further incentive for Benedictine communities to join the Cluniac Order.

As perhaps the wealthiest monastic house of the Western world, Cluny hired managers and workers to do the traditional labour of monks.

Instead of being limited to the traditional fare of broth and porridge, the monks ate very well, enjoying roasted chickens (a luxury in France then), wines from their vineyards and cheeses made by their employees.

At Cluny, the central activity was the liturgy; it was extensive and beautifully presented in inspiring surroundings, reflecting the new personally-felt wave of piety of the 11th century.

Monastic intercession was believed indispensable to achieving a state of grace, and lay rulers competed to be remembered in Cluny's endless prayers; this inspired the endowments in land and benefices that made other arts possible.

[7] The building campaign was financed by the annual census established by Ferdinand I of León, ruler of a united León-Castile, some time between 1053 and 1065.

When payments in aurei later lapsed, the Cluniac order suffered a financial crisis that crippled them during the abbacies of Pons of Melgueil (1109–1125) and Peter the Venerable (1122–1156).

Free of lay and episcopal interference, and responsible only to the papacy (which was in a state of weakness and disorder, with rival popes supported by competing nobles), Cluny was seen to have revitalized the Norman church, reorganized the royal French monastery at Fleury and inspired St Dunstan in England.

Henry's act of raising the English priories to independent abbeys was a political gesture, a mark of England's nascent national consciousness.

[2] Well-born and educated Cluniac priors worked eagerly with local royal and aristocratic patrons of their houses, filled responsible positions in their chanceries and were appointed to bishoprics.

In Germany, the penetration of Cluniac ideals was effected in concert with Henry III of the Salian dynasty, who had married a daughter of the duke of Aquitaine.

Within his order, the Abbot of Cluny was free to assign any monk to any house; he created a fluid structure[clarification needed] around a central authority that was to become a feature of the royal chanceries of England and of France, and of the bureaucracy of the great independent dukes, such as that of Burgundy.

As other religious orders such as the Cistercians in the 12th and then the Mendicants in the 13th century arose within the Western Christian church, the competition gradually weakened the status and influence of the abbey.

Although the monks – who never numbered more than 60 – lived in relative luxury during this period, the political and religious wars of the 16th century further weakened the abbey's status in Christendom.

[8] For instance with the Concordat of Bologna in 1516 overseen by Antoine Duprat, Francis I, the king of France, gained the power to appoint the abbot of Cluny from Pope Leo X.