Trub Abbey is a former

Benedictine The Benedictines, officially the Order of Saint Benedict (, abbreviated as O.S.B. or OSB), are a mainly contemplative monastic order of the Catholic Church for men and for women who follow the Rule of Saint Benedict. Initiated in 529, th ...

monastery in the municipality of Trub in

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Switzerland Switzerland, officially the Swiss Confederation, is a landlocked country located in west-central Europe. It is bordered by Italy to the south, France to the west, Germany to the north, and Austria and Liechtenstein to the east. Switzerland ...

History

In 1125 Thüring von Lützelflüh donated land around modern Trub to St. Blaise Abbey in the Black Forest to establish a monk's cell. A few years later, between 1128 and 1130, he was able to separate Trub from St. Blaise and raise it to an independent Abbey. At that time it was dedicated to the Holy Cross. The Abbey's lands and rights, at that time it was recorded as ''monasterium de Trouba'', were confirmed by

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Innocent II and

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Conrad III in 1139. Around 1224 it was known as the ''convent von Truob''. The secular and military rights over the monastery lands remained with the Lützelflüh family and their descendants, the

Freiherr (; male, abbreviated as ), (; his wife, abbreviated as , ) and (, his unmarried daughters and maiden aunts) are designations used as titles of nobility in the German-speaking areas of the Holy Roman Empire, the Austro-Hungarian Empire and in ...

en von Brandis until 1455. The rights were then sold to Kaspar von Scharnachtal who held them until his death in 1473, after which they transferred to the city of

. During the 13th century, the Abbey forged political ties with Bern and in 1286 its residents became citizens of the city. The confirmation document of 1139 listed 40 properties that the Abbey owned, including 28 in the Emmental region and 7 in Oberaargau. The remaining five were more distant properties, two

vineyard A vineyard ( , ) is a plantation of grape-bearing vines. Many vineyards exist for winemaking; others for the production of raisins, table grapes, and non-alcoholic grape juice. The science, practice and study of vineyard production is kno ...

s between Cressier and La Neuveville and farm houses in Därligen on Lake Thun, in Entlebuch, Canton of Lucerne and Otelfingen in

Zürich Zurich (; ) is the list of cities in Switzerland, largest city in Switzerland and the capital of the canton of Zurich. It is in north-central Switzerland, at the northwestern tip of Lake Zurich. , the municipality had 448,664 inhabitants. The ...

.Trub Municipal website-History
accessed 6 August 2014 The Abbey buildings grew rapidly over the following years and a Romanesque church was built. Over the following centuries, the Abbey continued to receive or purchase property throughout western Switzerland. Several houses and places in these communities still bear the name Trub from when they were owned by the Abbey. The village of Trub grew up around the Abbey and was under the low court of the Abbey. However, the high court was under the secular Kyburgs. The Abbey provided chaplains and lay priests to many communities within the Emmental, which they recruited from the local farmers. A total of 24 abbots are known to have presided over the Abbey. In the early years of the Abbey, these abbots came from the minor nobility or the

Ministerialis The ''ministeriales'' (singular: ''ministerialis'') were a legally unfree but socially elite class of knights, administrators, and officials in the High Middle Ages in the Holy Roman Empire, drawn from a mix of servile origins, free commoners, and ...

(unfree knights in the service of a

feudal Feudalism, also known as the feudal system, was a combination of legal, economic, military, cultural, and political customs that flourished in Middle Ages, medieval Europe from the 9th to 15th centuries. Broadly defined, it was a way of struc ...

overlord) class. After 1400, this changed and the abbots were now former farmers or livestock herders. In 1414 the mostly wooden Abbey was almost totally destroyed in a fire. It was rebuilt in stone, but in 1501 large parts were destroyed again in a fire. In 1528 Bern accepted the new faith of the

Protestant Reformation The Reformation, also known as the Protestant Reformation or the European Reformation, was a time of major theological movement in Western Christianity in 16th-century Europe that posed a religious and political challenge to the papacy and ...

and secularized all the monasteries in their territory. Most of the Abbey library and its treasures did not survive the two fires and the Reformation. The last abbot of Trub, Heinrich Ruoff, and the remaining nine members residents received a stipend from the Canton to leave the Abbey. The church was converted into a Swiss Reformed

parish church A parish church (or parochial church) in Christianity is the Church (building), church which acts as the religious centre of a parish. In many parts of the world, especially in rural areas, the parish church may play a significant role in com ...

. The east and west wings of the Abbey gradually fell into disrepair and were demolished. The south wing was bought by a local farmer and converted into a farm house. The

coat of arms A coat of arms is a heraldry, heraldic communication design, visual design on an escutcheon (heraldry), escutcheon (i.e., shield), surcoat, or tabard (the last two being outer garments), originating in Europe. The coat of arms on an escutcheon f ...

of the Abbey became the coat of arms for the municipality of Trub.

References

{{Authority control Benedictine monasteries in Switzerland Christian monasteries established in the 1120s Buildings and structures in the canton of Bern

History

See also

References