MAYTE IN THE ABBEY OF SANTA MARIA DE SANTES CREUS

Today, The Grandma has received news from Mayte, one of her closest friends.

Mayte has visited the Monastery of Santa Maria de Santes Creus in Aiguamúrcia (L'Alt Camp county), and she has shared her memories and photos with The Grandma.

The Monastery of Santa Maria de Santes Creus, in Catalan Reial Monestir de Santa Maria de Santes Creus, is a former Cistercian monastery in the municipality of Aiguamúrcia, Catalonia.

The abbey was erected in the 12th century, in today's municipality of Aiguamurcia, in the village of Santes Creus. However, it was in the thirteenth century when Pere III expressed his desire to be buried in the monastery and a royal crypt was built for himself and his son, King Jaume II that many of the local nobility established the custom to choose this place for burial. This led to the monastery to increase in splendor and greatness thanks to the numerous donations received.

Santes Creus along with Vallbona de les Monges and Poblet Monastery are known as the known as the Cistercian triangle, that helped consolidate power in Catalonia in the 12th century.

The monastery's origins date to 1158, when the Lords of Montagut and Albà donated the village of Santes Creus to the monks of Valldaura. The papal decree that was required to establish a monastery was made by Pope Alexander II, and construction of the monastery began in 1174. The complex was completed in 1225.

King Pere III chose to be buried in the Monastery of Santes Creus, and so did his son Jaume II (1276-1285) and his wife, Blanca of Anjou. Jaume II had a section of the abbey turned into royal rooms, the original Romanesque cloister rebuilt in the Gothic style of the 13th century, and a dome added to the church's crossing. The walls were built under King Pere IV. From the time of Pere IV, the royal favour was transferred to the Monastery of Poblet.

More information: Patrimoni-Generalitat de Catalunya

The monastic complex continued to expand during the 17th and 18th century, until, following the Ecclesiastical Confiscations of Mendizábal in 1835, the Cistercians left and building activities ceased. The monastery was declared a national monument in 1921.

The sepulchre of King Pere III was executed from 1291 to 1307 by Bartomeu de Girona, and looks richer than those of his son (and commissioner of the work), Jaume II, and of the latter's wife, Blanca of Naples. It consists of an urn surrounded by the images of saints, placed over a red porphyry Roman bath brought here by admiral Roger de Llúria.

The mausoleum of Jaume II and his wife Blanca was created by Bertran Riquer in 1313–1315. The tombs are in marble, with portraits of the two monarchs, wearing Cistercian attires, lying on the two slopes of the sepulchre's top.

The original cloister was a Romanesque structure, dating to the late 12th-early 13th century. All that remains of the first cloister is a hexagonal central shrine, containing the laundry.

By request of King Jaume II, the original cloister was largely demolished and replaced by a Gothic cloister designed by Reinard de Fonoll, whose work was continued by his disciple Guillem de Seguer. The style of tracery which fills the upper parts of each ogival opening in the cloister arcade varies from English Geometric to Catalan in design. The clustered columns have highly ornamented capitals with foliate, animal and human figures, as well as biblical scenes. Recesses in the walls house tombs of several Catalan noblemen, and show remains of paintings, one representing the Annunciation.

The cloister can be accessed from the monastery's external square through the Porta de l'Assumpta or Porta Reial, a Romanesque portal.

More information: Catalunya

If you're sitting in a monastery,
where your schedule is set
and you have very few uncontrolled variables,
that's fantastic that you can do loving/kindness meditation,
but that's not the world I live in.

Tim Ferriss

MAYTE IN SANTA MARIA DE VALLBONA DE LES MONGES

Today, The Grandma has received news from Mayte, one of her closest friends.

Mayte has visited Santa Maria de Vallbona de les Monges, a Monastery in L'Urgell county, and she has shared her memories and photos with The Grandma.

 

Vallbona Abbey, otherwise the Monastery of Santa Maria de Vallbona, is a Cistercian nunnery in Vallbona de les Monges, in the county of l'Urgell, Catalonia.

Founded in the early 12th century, and built between then and the 14th century, it is one of the most important monastic sites in Catalonia. Its church represents an example of transition between Romanesque and Gothic architecture. The abbey was declared a national monument on 3 June 1931.

Together with the monasteries of Poblet and of Santes Creus it forms part of the Cistercian Route.

Initially the monastery consisted of a community of hermits or anchorites of both sexes, founded by Ramon de Vallbona and documented from 1157, which followed the Rule of St. Benedict.

In 1163 the community received a gift of land from Ramon Berenguer IV, count of Barcelona.

By 1175 only a small group of nuns remained, who decided to affiliate themselves to the Cistercian Order. The first abbess, Oria Ramirez, was appointed in the following year from Tulebras Abbey in Tulebras, Navarre.

The abbey received several privileges from King Alfonso II and his wife Sancha of Castile, and was subsequently able to expand thanks to the numerous gifts from noble families. From Pope Innocent III the abbey received in 1198 and 1200 the grant of Papal immunity and protection of goods, and a bull in 1201 regulated the enclosure and ensured its independence from the episcopate. King Jaume I not only stayed in the abbey on repeated occasions but also sponsored its construction.

Thanks to the numerous properties received through donations and wills, among them that of Count Ermengol VII himself, the sizeable lordship of the abbey was formed between the 12th and 14th centuries, especially in the County of Urgell. Legal confirmation was achieved under the mandate of Abbess Saurena de Anglesola (1379-1392), who bought from King Pere III the civil and criminal jurisdiction of all the monastery's possessions for 22,000 Barcelona salaries. These acquisitions allowed the establishment of the barony of Vallbona and made the monastery the centre of political and legal life for all the towns and districts that made it up. At this time, the community was made up of about 150 nuns, most of whom belonged to the Catalan nobility, from families such as the Cardonas, Cerveras, Queralts, Boixadors and Anglesolas.

More information: Monestir de Santa Maria de Vallbona

The abbey's library together with the scriptorium achieved great fame. Fourteen codices from the 13th century were copied and illustrated by the old nuns and are kept in the archive with numerous old documents of great interest for regional and national historiography. The pharmacy, which supplied all the villages of the barony, has surviving documentation from the 15th century.

The abbey was deeply impacted by the Catalan civil war of 1462-1472 and later the Council of Trent (1545-1563), which had a notable repercussion on the abbey: one of its agreements prohibited the existence of female religious communities in unpopulated places, which forced the nuns in 1573 to cede part of their lands to people from other places, mainly Montesquieu, in order to create a centre of population around the abbey so that it could stay where it was. This was the origin of the present town of Vallbona de les Monges.

For this purpose, all the monastery's external buildings were converted (similar to those that still remain in Poblet Abbey and Santes Creus), and only the strictly conventual premises were retained, apart from the church and the cloister. The following times were difficult. 

In the 17th century there were disputes with the Cistercian order, mainly with Poblet Abbey over the dues Vallbona had to pay them. These weakened the abbey's economy, and the financial situation was made still worse by the ravages caused by the Reapers' War (1640-1652), followed by the War of the Spanish Succession (1705-1717) and the Roussillon War (1788-1795). The nuns also had numerous disputes with the towns belonging to their barony. The Ecclesiastical confiscations of Mendizábal in the 1830s caused them to be exclaustrated for six months, but they were able to continue monastic life and did not suffer as much damage as the monasteries of Poblet or Santes Creus.

Since then the abbey has housed a community of Cistercian nuns uninterruptedly, with the sole exception of the period of the Spanish Civil War, and remains a functioning monastery, although it is open to visitors daily.

In 1986, the Department of Culture of the Generalitat de Catalunya commissioned the architect Llorens i Perelló to restore the buildings and to construct a new building for the nuns' cells and work rooms. These works were resumed in 1997. Some rooms have been fitted out for accommodation which, together with ceramic works, word processing and computer music scores, and tourist visits to the monastery, represent a good source of income for the community.

More information: La Ruta del Císter

 I like the monastic life... in the prayer and the praising...
this has charged me with new energy, spiritual energy.
This is very important for my ministry outside the monastery.

Pope Theodoros II