important abbey commemorated the cult of an early bishop, St. Mélaine (d. ca. 530).
Frankish influence was strong, and with Nantes, Rennes formed part of the March of
Brittany. In 831, however, Emperor Louis the Pious, unable to defeat the Bretons by
force, appointed Nominoe missus of both the Celtic and Frankish parts of Brittany, and
Rennes came under Breton political control. Factional disputes and Viking invasions
allowed a new comital dynasty to emerge; ties with royal France remained strong. The
10th and 11th centuries witnessed an intense rivalry with the counts of Nantes for the
ducal title, which Conan I of Rennes (d. 992) obtained. A family quarrel allowed Eudo,
brother of Alain III (r. 1008–40), to seize Rennes after his death. From 1084, Alain
Fergent (r. 1084–1113) reunited it with the rest of the ducal domain. With Nantes and
Vannes, Rennes remained a center of ducal administration.
The court of the seneschal at Rennes received appeals from other Breton
sénéchaussées, with the exception of Nantes. The city, politically and strategically
important, was frequently attacked. Its Roman walls, which had enclosed 22 acres, were
strengthened by a ducal castle after the late 10th century. Henry II of England took the
town in 1182 and destroyed the castle. During the Breton civil war (1341–64), Rennes
was held for Charles de Blois and Jeanne de Penthièvre; it withstood a nine-month siege
by the English (1356–57). But the need to defend new suburbs and a total population of
around 14,000, living in nine parishes, led between 1421 and 1476 to the construction of
two further enceintes. Some 155 acres were eventually enclosed, including the abbey of
Saint-Georges, a ducal foundation (ca. 1030) for Benedictine nuns, and low-lying
quarters south of the Vilaine, where small craft industries, notably textile and
leatherworking, had developed. The defenses were tested for the last time by a French
siege in 1491, before Duchess Anne married Charles VIII and delivered Rennes, and
Brittany, into royal hands. Among the distinguished bishops of Rennes may be noted the
poet and reformer Marbode (r. 1096–1120) and Étienne de Fougères (r. 1168–78), author
and servant of Henry II of England. St. Yves Helory (d. 1303) was briefly the bishop’s
official. A Franciscan convent was established ca. 1238; the Dominicans arrived in 1368
and the Carmelites in 1448. Printing was introduced in 1483. Medieval Rennes was
almost totally destroyed in a great fire in 1720. The church of Saint-Mélaine has some
Romanesque portions but was poorly rebuilt in the 14th, 15th, and 17th centuries.
Michael C.E.Jones
[See also: BRITTANY; ÉTIENNE DE FOUGÈRES; LATIN LYRIC POETRY;
MARBODE OF RENNES; NANTES]
Leguay, Jean-Pierre. La ville de Rennes au XVe siècle a travers les comptes des miseurs. Paris:
Klincksieck, 1968.
Meyer, Jean, ed. Histoire de Rennes. Toulouse: Privat, 1972.
REQUÊTES, MAÎTRE DES
. The name Requêtes de l’Hôtel, or “Requests of the Household,” was first given in the
reign of Philip III (r. 1270–85) to the informal judicial sessions at which the king
presided in person, earlier known as the Plaids de la Porte, or “Pleas of the Doorway.”
Medieval france: an encyclopedia 1500