FLAVIGNY-SUR-OZERAIN, ABBEY OF

Former benedictine monastery in the town that has taken its name, in Côte d'Or, France, Diocese of Autun (present-day Diocese of Dijon). This much-fought-over abbey was founded in the 8th century by a Burgundian noble and was much favored by charles martel. Almost immediately, however, the monks and the bishops of Autun entered into a long-lasting struggle over control of the abbey. The presence at the abbey of the relics of St. Reine (or Regina) of Alise, an Autun marytr, had already given it great renown before it became part of the cluniac reform movement in the late 10th century. But despite its Cluniac affiliation and its much later incorporation into the maurist congregation (1644), the abbey was the prey of the bishops of Autun and later of the Jesuits and had a notable controversy with the Franciscans concerning the relics of St. Reine. The abbey was suppressed in 1790 during the French Revolution; although destroyed, it again became popularly known when J. B.H. lacordaire, the 19th-century Burgundian restorer of the dominicans, founded a novitiate at Flavigny. Today the motherhouse of the Dominicaines missionaires des Campagnes is in the village. Only the crypt of the old monastery is still in existence.

Bibliography: Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Scriptores (Berlin 1826–) 3:150–152; 8:502–503, a catalogue of the abbots of Flavigny from 755 to 1096. Gallia Christiana, v. 1–13 (Paris 1715–85), v. 14–16 (Paris 1856–65) 4:454–465. d. a. mortier, Flavigny: L'Abbaye et la ville, 720–1920 (Paris 1920). r. gazeau, Catholicisme. Hier, aujourd'hui et demain, ed. g. jacquemet (Paris 1947–) 4:1337–39.

[l. gaillard]