Altomünster Abbey (Kloster Altomünster) was a monastery in the small

Bavaria Bavaria, officially the Free State of Bavaria, is a States of Germany, state in the southeast of Germany. With an area of , it is the list of German states by area, largest German state by land area, comprising approximately 1/5 of the total l ...

n market town of

Altomünster Altomünster is a Municipalities in Germany, municipality in the district of Dachau (district), Dachau in Bavaria in Germany. Geography Geographical location The market is located northwest of Dachau and almost in the middle of the triangle form ...

History

A small monastery was founded here by and named after Saint Alto, a wandering monk, before 760. The ''vita'' of Alto, likely written by Otloh of St. Emmeram after 1056 and ostensibly based on oral knowledge (written lore having been lost through plunder), reports that the monastery was visited by

Saint Boniface Boniface, OSB (born Wynfreth; 675 –5 June 754) was an English Benedictines, Benedictine monk and leading figure in the Anglo-Saxon mission to the Germanic parts of Francia during the eighth century. He organised significant foundations of ...

, who dedicated the church. Another 11th-century text notes that Boniface also dedicated the church in nearby Benediktbeuern Abbey. Sometime before 1000 the Welfs enlarged it and made it into a

Benedictine The Benedictines, officially the Order of Saint Benedict (, abbreviated as O.S.B. or OSB), are a mainly contemplative monastic order of the Catholic Church for men and for women who follow the Rule of Saint Benedict. Initiated in 529, th ...

abbey.

Welf I, Duke of Bavaria Welf I ( 1035/10406 November 1101) was Duke of Bavaria from 1070 to 1077 and from 1096 to his death. He was the first member of the Welf branch of the House of Este. In the genealogy of the Elder House of Welf, he is counted as Welf IV. Bio ...

resettled the monks in 1056 to the newly founded Weingarten Abbey in Altdorf (now also called Weingarten), while the nuns formerly resident at Altdorf moved to Altomünster, where they lived until the monastery was dissolved in 1488 by Pope

Innocent VIII Pope Innocent VIII (; ; 1432 – 25 July 1492), born Giovanni Battista Cybo (or Cibo), was head of the Catholic Church and ruler of the Papal States from 29 August 1484 to his death, in July 1492. Son of the viceroy of Naples, Cybo spent his ea ...

. In 1496 by grant of Duke George the Rich the Bridgettines of Maihingen were permitted to establish a Bridgettine monastery at Altomünster. The monastery was dissolved on 18 March 1803 during the secularisation of Bavaria, but was later revived. At the time of its closing, it was the last Bridgettine monastery in

Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen States of Germany, constituent states have a total popu ...

. Nearby is a museum of the history of the Bridgettine Order. In December 2015, it was announced that the monastery was closing for good and that both its property and library, which contains around 80 percent of all known Bridgettine books, would be transferred to the Munich diocese. It officially closed on January 19, 2017. Two

gospel Gospel originally meant the Christianity, Christian message ("the gospel"), but in the second century Anno domino, AD the term (, from which the English word originated as a calque) came to be used also for the books in which the message w ...

lectionary A lectionary () is a book or listing that contains a collection of scripture readings appointed for Christianity, Christian or Judaism, Jewish worship on a given day or occasion. There are sub-types such as a "gospel lectionary" or evangeliary, ...

created for the abbey in the 12th century are held by the

Bavarian State Library The Bavarian State Library (, abbreviated BSB, called ''Bibliotheca Regia Monacensis'' before 1919) in Munich is the central " Landesbibliothek", i. e. the state library of the Free State of Bavaria, the biggest universal and research libra ...

References

External links

*
Altomünster Abbey website

Altomünster Museum Website

Bridgettine Order

The Warburg Institute Iconographic Database (images of Altomünster)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Altomunster Abbey Monasteries in Bavaria Benedictine nunneries in Germany Bridgettine monasteries in Germany Christian monasteries established in the 8th century Carolingian architecture Irish monastic foundations in continental Europe 8th-century establishments in Germany

History

See also

References

External links