Romuald (Latin: Romualdus; c. 951 – traditionally 19 June, c. 1025/27 AD)[4] was the founder of the Camaldolese order and a major figure in the eleventh-century "Renaissance of eremitical asceticism".

His injudicious correction of the less zealous aroused such enmity against him that he applied for, and was readily granted, permission to retire to Venice, where he placed himself under the direction of a hermit named Marinus and lived a life of extraordinary severity.

[7] His reputation being known to advisors of the Holy Roman Emperor Otto III, Romuald was persuaded by him to take the vacant office of abbot at Sant'Apollinare to help bring about a more dedicated way of life there.

The monks, however, resisted his reforms, and after a year, Romuald resigned, hurling his abbot's staff at Otto's feet in total frustration.

Here, according to the legend, a certain Maldolus, who had seen a vision of monks in white garments ascending into Heaven, gave him some land, afterwards known as the Campus Maldoli, or Camaldoli.

The abbot of Sant Miguel de Cuxa, Guarinus, had also begun reforms but mainly built upon a third Christian tradition, that of the Iberian Peninsula.

The admonition in his rule Empty yourself completely and sit waiting places him in relation to the long Christian history of intellectual stillness and interior passivity in meditation also reflected in the nearly contemporary Byzantine ascetic practice known as Hesychasm.