The Abbey of Saint Victor, Paris, also known as Royal Abbey and School of Saint Victor, was an abbey near

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), ma ...

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Oceans. Its metropolitan area ...

. Its origins are connected to the decision of

William of Champeaux Guillaume de Champeaux (18 January 1121 in Châlons-en-Champagne), known in English as William of Champeaux and Latinised to Gulielmus de Campellis, was a French philosopher and theologian. Biography William was born at Champeaux near Melun. ...

, the Archdeacon of Paris, to retire to a small hermitage near Paris in 1108. He took on the life, vocation and observances of the

Canons Regular Canons regular are priests who live in community under a rule ( and canon in greek) and are generally organised into religious orders, differing from both secular canons and other forms of religious life, such as clerics regular, designated by ...

, and his new community followed the

Augustinian Rule The Rule of Saint Augustine, written about the year 400, is a brief document divided into eight chapters and serves as an outline for religious life lived in community. It is the oldest monastic rule in the Western Church. The rule, developed ...

. William was famed for his teaching, and was followed to his hermitage by many of his disciples, including Peter Abelard, and was convinced by them to take up his lecturing again. William was made

Bishop of Châlons-sur-Marne A bishop is an ordained clergy member who is entrusted with a position of authority and oversight in a religious institution. In Christianity, bishops are normally responsible for the governance of dioceses. The role or office of bishop is ca ...

in 1113, and was succeeded in his hermitage at St. Victor's by Gilduin, who promoted the canonical order and its new abbey vigorously. Through generous gifts from popes, kings, queens, and nobles, the Abbey of St. Victor was soon richly endowed. Many houses of

canons regular Canons regular are priests who live in community under a rule ( and canon in greek) and are generally organised into religious orders, differing from both secular canons and other forms of religious life, such as clerics regular, designated by ...

came under its influence and were reformed through its leadership, including the Abbey of Ste Geneviève (Paris),

Wigmore Abbey Wigmore Abbey was an abbey of Canons Regular with a grange, from 1179 to 1530, situated about a mile (2 km) north of the village of Wigmore, Herefordshire, England: grid reference SO 410713. Only ruins of the abbey now remain and on Histo ...

in Herefordshire, St. Augustine's (

Bristol Bristol () is a city, ceremonial county and unitary authority in England. Situated on the River Avon, it is bordered by the ceremonial counties of Gloucestershire to the north and Somerset to the south. Bristol is the most populous city in ...

), St. Catherine's (

Waterford "Waterford remains the untaken city" , mapsize = 220px , pushpin_map = Ireland#Europe , pushpin_map_caption = Location within Ireland##Location within Europe , pushpin_relief = 1 , coordinates ...

), St. Thomas's (

Dublin Dublin (; , or ) is the capital and largest city of Ireland. On a bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the province of Leinster, bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, a part of the Wicklow Mountains range. At the 2016 c ...

), and

San Pietro ad Aram The Basilica of San Pietro ad Aram is a Baroque architecture, Baroque-style, Roman Catholic church in Naples, Italy. It is located about a block from the church of the Santissima Annunziata Maggiore, Naples, Santissima Annunziata on Corso Umberto ...

(

Naples Naples (; it, Napoli ; nap, Napule ), from grc, Νεάπολις, Neápolis, lit=new city. is the regional capital of Campania and the third-largest city of Italy, after Rome and Milan, with a population of 909,048 within the city's adminis ...

). King

Louis VIII Louis VIII (5 September 1187 – 8 November 1226), nicknamed The Lion (french: Le Lion), was King of France from 1223 to 1226. As prince, he invaded England on 21 May 1216 and was excommunicated by a papal legate on 29 May 1216. On 2 June 1216 ...

mentioned no less than forty abbeys of the Order of St. Victor in his last will and testament, and he left 4,000 pounds to be equally divided among them, and all his jewels for the building of the abbey church in Paris. Before the abbey was 160 years old, several cardinals and at least eight significant abbots had been produced from among its members. Abbaye Saint-Victor de Paris en 1655

The traditions of William of Champeaux were handed on, and the abbey became a center of piety and learning, attracting famous students, scholars and intellectuals including Hugh of St. Victor,

Peter Lombard Peter Lombard (also Peter the Lombard, Pierre Lombard or Petrus Lombardus; 1096, Novara – 21/22 July 1160, Paris), was a scholastic theologian, Bishop of Paris, and author of '' Four Books of Sentences'' which became the standard textbook of ...

and

Thomas Becket Thomas Becket (), also known as Saint Thomas of Canterbury, Thomas of London and later Thomas à Becket (21 December 1119 or 1120 – 29 December 1170), was an English nobleman who served as Lord Chancellor from 1155 to 1162, and then ...

. In fact, the

school of Saint Victor The school of St Victor was the medieval monastic school at the Augustinian abbey of St Victor in Paris. The name also refers to the Victorines, the group of philosophers and mystics based at this school as part of the University of Paris. It ...

, with the schools of Ste Geneviève and Notre-Dame de Paris, was the cradle of the

University of Paris , image_name = Coat of arms of the University of Paris.svg , image_size = 150px , caption = Coat of Arms , latin_name = Universitas magistrorum et scholarium Parisiensis , motto = ''Hic et ubique terrarum'' (Latin) , mottoeng = Here and a ...

Formation

It was around 1108 that William of Champeaux retired from teaching with a few disciples in a hermitage (or cella) abandoned near a chapel dedicated to St. Victor, at the foot of the Montagne Sainte-Geneviève (the abbey remained outside the walls of the enclosure built by Philip Augustus at the end of the twelfth century). In 1113, when William was elected Bishop of Chalons-sur-Marne, Louis VI transformed the small retreat into an abbey that was richly endowed the following year. The Pope dedicated the foundation. The successor of William was the prior Gilduin, dearest disciple of William and confessor of the king. Born in Paris, he is the abbot of 1113–1155. It is most probably during his abbacy, that the customs of St. Victor were composed in the Liber Ordinis Sancti Victoris, following a rigorous asceticism, where silence and manual labor prevailed. In 1148, the abbey acquired the college of Sainte-Geneviève. The abbey later fell on hard times, being identified in the 17th and early 18th centuries with the

Jansenist Jansenism was an early modern theological movement within Catholicism, primarily active in the Kingdom of France, that emphasized original sin, human depravity, the necessity of divine grace, and predestination. It was declared a heresy by th ...

movement. It was dissolved and destroyed during the

French Revolution The French Revolution ( ) was a period of radical political and societal change in France that began with the Estates General of 1789 and ended with the formation of the French Consulate in coup of 18 Brumaire, November 1799. Many of its ...

. The site of the former abbey is now largely occupied by Paris VI and VII Universities and by the Muséum and Jardin des Plantes. The name survives in a neighbouring street.

Makeup of the Congregation

The Victorines are one of the most illustrious of the twelfth-century congregations in terms of cosmopolitan and intellectual pursuits. Thanks to Hugh and his comprehensive teachings, the school took on a universalist dimension that Victorines defended against those who wanted to "rip and shred the whole body and who, by a perverse judgment, arbitrarily choose whatever pleases them." Saint-Victor became a popular retreat of

Bernard of Clairvaux Bernard of Clairvaux, O. Cist. ( la, Bernardus Claraevallensis; 109020 August 1153), venerated as Saint Bernard, was an abbot, mystic, co-founder of the Knights Templars, and a major leader in the reformation of the Benedictine Order throug ...

and

(1118-1170), and the bishops of Paris had an apartment there. The cloister became a public school of theology and liberal arts, a kind of monastery-university attended by the philosopher Abelard and Peter Lombard, author of the famous

Sentences ''The Four Books of Sentences'' (''Libri Quattuor Sententiarum'') is a book of theology written by Peter Lombard in the 12th century. It is a systematic compilation of theology, written around 1150; it derives its name from the '' sententiae'' ...

(Libri Quattuor Sententiarum).

Library

The abbey had a rich library open to the public. In the consulting room the manuscripts were chained. But there were other properties: liturgical manuscripts were kept for the choir, some others near the refectory, for reading aloud in the infirmary to the sick and dying, and others consisting of double reserves by the librarian (armarius). Part of the library consisted of a group of books (minores) the canons or students could borrow over long periods (concessi). The teaching of the abbey activity The most important texts emanating from the teaching activity in the abbey are being made available in English translation in the series Victorine Texts in Translation, Turnhout: Brepols Publishers, 2010 -. favoured the development of library funds. Richly endowed, the abbey would be filled by purchases or copies from elsewhere: the scriptorium seems not to have been well developed. Endowments also enriched the collection. In addition, the documents found upon the death of a Victorin (sermons, for example) were compiled and stored in the library. In

Gargantua and Pantagruel ''The Life of Gargantua and of Pantagruel'' (french: La vie de Gargantua et de Pantagruel) is a pentalogy of novels written in the 16th century by François Rabelais, telling the adventures of two giants, Gargantua ( , ) and his son Pantagruel ...

by Rabelais, there are satirical references to the library of St Victor (Chapter VII.6).

Scriptorium

The

scriptorium Scriptorium (), literally "a place for writing", is commonly used to refer to a room in medieval European monasteries devoted to the writing, copying and illuminating of manuscripts commonly handled by monastic scribes. However, lay scribes an ...

of Saint-Victor has certainly been the cause of experience glosses texts of Scripture by formatting columns, "formal provision entirely unique"; the biblical text in the center, and commentaries on the outside. This seems to be influence of Italian origin as regards their decoration.

Masters of Saint-Victor

The main and iconic masters of this scholarly abbey remain Hugh and Richard of St. Victor. The first being recognized as the true founder of the school, abbot of 1125-1140, the complete scholar, philosopher, mystic and teacher, whose book ''De sacramentis christianae fidei'' (1136-1141) is the most important theological synthesis before scholastic Saint

Thomas Aquinas Thomas Aquinas, OP (; it, Tommaso d'Aquino, lit=Thomas of Aquino; 1225 – 7 March 1274) was an Italian Dominican friar and priest who was an influential philosopher, theologian and jurist in the tradition of scholasticism; he is known wit ...

. The second, Richard of St. Victor is considered the founder of the medieval mysticism. Philosophies developed by these Victorines were to give a rational support for the mystical, aided by divine grace, enlightenment or innate principles of truth to the soul. One of the goals of all the Victorines was to promote the spiritual life.

Burials at the Abbey

William de Braose, 4th Lord of Bramber William de Braose, (or William de Briouze), 4th Lord of Bramber (1144/1153 – 9 August 1211), court favourite of King John of England, at the peak of his power, was also Lord of Gower, Abergavenny, Brecknock, Builth, Radnor, Kington, L ...

References

External links

Abbey of St Victor
{{DEFAULTSORT:Saint Victor's Abbey, Paris Augustinian monasteries in France Former buildings and structures in Paris 1108 establishments in Europe 1100s establishments in France 18th-century disestablishments in France Monasteries destroyed during the French Revolution