CHUR, MONASTERY OF

Former Premonstratensian abbey, Graubünden canton, Switzerland, Diocese of Chur (patron, St. Lucius). It is improbable that the Benedictine foundation dated from St. lucius, but possibly a small clerical community, living on the site, became Benedictine c. 800. Before 1149, Conrad of Biberegg, Bishop of Chur, committed the monastery to the premonstratensians from Roggenburg and relocated the nuns of the original double monastery at St. Hilary, not far from the abbey. Churwalden in the Engadine was a daughterhouse. In 1529 the abbot Theodul Schlegl was martyred by the Calvinists, and the abbey was suppressed in 1538. The community found refuge at Bendern in Liechtenstein. In 1624 Chur was restored, though most of its possessions were lost. Although legally it was once again an abbey sui juris by 1717, it remained practically a dependent house of Roggenburg. In 1806 the last abbot surrendered the monastery to the bishopric of Chur, which now uses the abbey as its diocesan seminary.

Bibliography: c. l. hugo, S. Ordinis Praemonstratensis annales, 2 v. (Nancy 1734–36) 2:103–112. l. h. cottineau, Répertoire topobibliographique des abbayes et prieurés, 2 v. (Mâcon 1935–39) 1:831. n. backmund, Monasticon Praemonstratense, 3v. (Straubing 1949–56) 1:68–70. m. h. vicaire and n. backmund, Dictionnaire d'histoire et de géographie ecclésiastiques, ed. a. baudrillart et al. (Paris 1912– ) 13:213–221. g. vasella, St-Luziuskirche (Munich 1955).

[n. backmund]