powers), as well as his policies of supporting Cluny, encouraging pilgrimage, sponsoring
the Peace of God, and appointing learned nonaristocratic bishops, all earned him the
enthusiastic support of the laity and the reforming church. In 1010, he had a Jew burned
outside Orléans for allegedly plotting the destruction of the Holy Sepulcher; and in 1022,
at the prompting of his ecclesiastical advisers, Robert had thirteen convicted heretics
burned at Orléans, the first official execution of heretics in western Europe. His final
years were complicated by the death of his chosen heir, Hugues (1026), and the battle for
succession between his choice, Henry, and his wife’s candidate, Robert.
Richard Landes
[See also: CAPETIAN DYNASTY; CONSTANCE OF ARLES; HENRY I; HUGH
CAPET]
Helgaud de Fleury. Vie de Robert le Pieux/Epitoma vitae regis Rotberti Pii, ed. and trans.
R.H.Bautier and Gillette Labory. Paris: CNRS, 1969.
Newman, William M. Catalogue des actes de Robert II roi de France. Paris: Sirey, 1937.
Pfister, Christian. Études sur le règne de Robert le Pieux (996–1031) Paris: Vieweg, 1885.
ROBERT D’ARBRISSEL
(ca. 1047–1117). Born in Brittany, the son of a priest, Robert became known as a
preacher supporting Gregorian clerical reform in Rennes in 1089. Soon thereafter, he
became a forest hermit, practicing extreme asceticism. He attracted many followers from
all levels of society and formed them into a community, but he soon left this group to
become a popular and powerful wandering preacher in France. He again attracted many
followers, especially women, and in 1101 he decided to found a community for them.
The site selected was at Fontevrault (Maine-et-Loire), near the Loire River in the diocese
of Poitiers. The result was a “double monastery” of women and men, living in separate
buildings but sharing a church. As finally organized, the community was ruled by an
abbess, with the women following a modified Benedictine Rule and the men, who
provided manual labor and sacramental services for the abbey, under the Augustinian
Rule. Robert founded a number of priories dependent upon Fontevrault and was effective
in attracting donations from the nobility in support of the resulting Order of Fontevrault.
Robert was buried in the church at Fontevrault, which also was the burial site for Henry
II Plantagenêt, Eleanor of Aquitaine, and Richard I the Lionhearted of England.
Grover A.Zinn
[See also: AUGUSTINE, RULE OF ST.; FONTEVRAULT; MONASTICISM]
Bienvenu, Jean-Marc. L’étonnant fondateur de Fontevraud, Robert d’Arbrissel. Paris: Nouvelles
Éditions Latines, 1981.
Dalarun, Jacques. L’impossible saintété: la vie retrouvée de Robert d ‘Arbrissel (v. 1045–1116)
fondateur de Fontevraud. Paris: Cerf, 1985.
Picard, Louis Auguste. Le fondateur de l’ordre de Fontevrauh: Robert d’Arbrissel, un apôtre du
XIe siècle, son temps, sa vie, ses disciples, son œuvre. Saumur: Girouard et Richou, 1932.
Medieval france: an encyclopedia 1514