or CLUGNY, a celebrated abbey of Benedictine monks, in a city of that name; being the head or chief of a congregation denominated from them.

It is situated in the Mâconnais, a little province of France, on the river Grône; and was founded by William duke of Berry and Aquitain; or, as others say, by the abbot Bernon, supported by that duke, in the year 910.

This abbey was anciently so very spacious and magnificent, that in 1245, after the holding of the first council of Lyons, Pope Innocent IV. went to Cluny, accompanied with the two patriarchs of Antioch and Constantinople, 12 cardinals, 3 archbishops, 15 bishops, and a great number of abbots; who were all entertained, without one of the monks being put out of their place; though S. Louis, Q. Blanche his mother, the duke of Artois his brother, and his sister, the emperor of Constantinople, the sons of the kings of Aragon and Castile, the duke of Burgundy, six counts, and a great number of lords, with all their retinues, were there at the same time.

Cluny, at its first erection, was put under the immediate protection of the apostolic see, with express prohibition to all secular and ecclesiastic powers, to disturb the monks in the possession of their effects, or the election of their abbot. By this they pretended to be exempted from the jurisdiction of bishops; which at length gave the hint to other abbeys to insist on the same.

Cluny is the head of a very numerous and extensive congregation: in effect, it was the first congregation of divers monasteries united under one chief, so as only to constitute one body, or, as they call it, one order, that ever arose.

This order of monks was brought into England by William earl of Warren, son-in-law to William the Conqueror, who built a house for them at Lewes in Sussex about the year 1077. There were 27 priories and cells of this order in England, which were governed by foreigners, afterwards made denizens.