CCM

Cahiers de Civilisation Médiévale

OV

Orderic Vitalis, Ecclesiastical history, ed. Marjorie Chibnall, Oxford 1969–80

RM

Revue Mabillon

VBT

Life of St Bernard of Tiron, PL clxxii. 1362–446

‘A troubled and varied career’.Footnote ¹ Such is David Knowles's assessment of Bernard of Abbeville, founder of the abbey of Tiron, which lies in the wooded landscape of the Perche region between Alençon and Chartres in western France.Footnote ² Bernard's career is conventionally coupled with those of Robert of Arbrissel and Vitalis of Mortain, all of them important figures in the ascetic revival in monasticism which gripped western Europe in the late eleventh and early twelfth centuries.Footnote ³ Yet while the Fontevraudine and Savignac affiliations that derived from Robert and Vitalis's activities have been much discussed, there is no major history of the abbey of Tiron. The rigour of Bernard's approach to monastic life, however, was much admired by contemporaries, including Henry i of England, David i of Scotland and Louis vi of France. His abbey was the source for more than a hundred communities throughout France and, perhaps surprisingly, in Scotland, Wales and England.Footnote ⁴ The speed with which these daughter houses were established over such a broad area was remarkable, but the impetus was not sustained, and the so-called ‘Order of Tiron’ had ceased to be an influential force within the western monastic tradition by the beginning of the thirteenth century.

The sources for the early history of the abbey of Tiron are fuller than for many other contemporary foundations. There is a cartulary or register of titles to property, compiled, according to its nineteenth-century editor, in the 1160s and several references in near-contemporary sources, the earliest of which dates from the 1120s.Footnote ⁵ Above all, however, there is a Life of Bernard of Abbeville, apparently written at Tiron, by Geoffrey,Footnote ⁶ who describes himself as the least of monks, ‘monachorum omnium infimus’, probably within twenty-five years of Bernard's death in April 1116.Footnote ⁷ The Vita Bernardi lies in a tradition of hagiographical writing that stretches back to Athanasius' life of St Anthony. By the eleventh century collections of founders' miracle storiesFootnote ⁸ had evolved into a powerful tool that could serve a political purpose in defending communities from lay interference, and it was not not uncommon for houses to commission Lives of their founders.Footnote ⁹ Marbod, bishop of Rennes, was commissioned, for example, to write a life of Abbot Robert of Chaise-Dieu and in the twelfth century Baudri of Bourgeuil would write a Life of Robert of Arbrissel at the request of Abbess Petronilla of Fontevraud.Footnote ¹⁰ The Vita Bernardi returns to the older approach, however, in which members of a community recorded the traditions of their houses.

It is a lengthy and repetitious work, which, at the turn of the twentieth century, was the subject of detailed scrutiny by the German scholar, Johannes von Walter. He concluded that it was an amalgam of two earlier works: a Life of Bernard that emphasised his links with his local aristocratic patrons, the Rotrou family, and another that described his connection with the cathedral at Chartres.Footnote ¹¹ Further investigation is required to nuance von Walter's work, but his suggestion is important for highlighting the erratic quality of the vita.Footnote ¹² Bernard's life before the foundation of Tiron is portrayed as a restless round of wanderings, interspersed with a series of incidents bearing remarkable similarities to one another, which prompted David Knowles to remark that Bernard's ‘biographer gives us glimpses without supplying the links of causality that might join the disconnected episodes’. A re-examination of Bernard's career in the context of those of his contemporaries and in the light of recent work on the twelfth-century Reformation may, however, begin to recover those links of causality.

The vita tells little about Bernard's parents or his childhood in Abbeville. Unlike the Lives of Vitalis of Mortain and Robert of Arbrissel, the Vita Bernardi does not even record the names of Bernard's parents, although the prominence of the name Bernard among twelfth-century Ponthevin lords perhaps links him with the elite of the area. Footnote ¹³ It does assert, however, that he enjoyed the best education that was available: ‘Encouraged by his family to the study of letters, God's grace took him from the bosom of his family to give him ready access to everything that would educate him. As a result his understanding of grammar and rhetoric flourished, as did his considerable skills in the art of literature.’Footnote ¹⁴ No indication is given of the location of these studies, but since Bernard died as an old man in the 1110s, he must have been educated around the 1050s, and therefore he probably studied in a cathedral or monastic school. For a Ponthevin Amiens or Laon would have been the nearest option, although the vita gives the impression that Bernard's studies took place in Ponthieu.Footnote ¹⁵ Bernard may therefore have studied in his native Abbeville at the monastery of Saint Riquier.

Bernard led an upright life throughout the period of his studies, according to the vita, and its reference to his adopting the regular habit of a canon may hint that he was intended for a cathedral chapter, or that he was already showing interest in the communal life. Such an interest might account for his decision to go southwards towards Aquitaine, for Walter of Autheil's foundation at Lesterps in the diocese of Limoges was at the peak of its fame.Footnote ¹⁶ In the event, however, he settled in Poitiers, the stronghold of the counts of Poitou, who were also dukes of Aquitaine. In the 1040s and 1050s the city was a major centre of learning. It had a long intellectual tradition dating back to Roman times, and in the early eleventh century the school at Saint-Hilaire-le-Grand was made famous by Hildegar, a pupil of Fulbert of Chartres. Although the author of the vita suggests that Bernard came to Poitiers in search of the monastic life, it is possible that he also sought to study and a magister scholarum at Poitiers does appear in a charter of 1060 at precisely the point when Bernard is likely to have been living in the city.Footnote ¹⁷

During his time in Poitiers, Bernard joined the abbey of St Cyprian, a traditional Benedictine community with close links to the comital dynasty.Footnote ¹⁸ Its leader was Abbot Reginald, who had taken up office in November 1073, and Bernard's profession must have taken place after that date since the vita says that Bernard was much influenced by the abbot's teaching. Reginald was a learned man, with a reputation as an advocate, and a correspondent of Lanfranc, as well as one of the earliest readers of Anselm's Monologion.Footnote ¹⁹ He had spent a period as a teacher, probably in Poitiers, since he was a native of Poitou, and had then become first a monk and subsequently prior at La Chaise-Dieu, the community that had gathered in the 1040s in the Livradois. Under the leadership of Robert of Turlande (d. 1067), this community attempted, in the words of its modern historian, ‘une sorte de synthèse entre l’érémetisme et le monachisme'.Footnote ²⁰ During the 1050s and 1060s a number of houses dependent on Chaise-Dieu had been founded and Abbot Reginald retained his friendship network within that community after his appointment to St Cyprian. Nevertheless the monastery that he directed and Bernard of Abbeville entered remained one of the wealthiest in Aquitaine.Footnote ²¹ Abbot Reginald himself was a man with considerable administrative as well as spiritual experience, for he was a valued servant of Pope Urban ii, for whom he collected a papal aid from the prelates and abbots of Aquitaine, Gascony and lower Burgundy.Footnote ²²

From this point on Bernard was committed to the monastic life, but he had entered a house where his talents and his education might prove useful, for St Cyprian was a community much favoured by the dukes of Aquitaine. In taking monastic vows Bernard differed from Vitalis of Mortain and Robert of Arbrissel who both remained secular clergy and retained links with their places of origin; Vitalis served as a chaplain to Robert, count of Mortain, lord of his birthplace of Tierceville, while Robert entered the household of Bishop Sylvester of Rennes, in whose diocese Arbrissel lay.Footnote ²³ Although the opportunities of the secular Church were not available to Bernard, he none the less appears, of the three, to have enoyed the most success as a career churchman. The vita indicates that he rose to be prior of Saint-Savin-sur-Gartempe, an important and ancient foundation that had led the monastic recovery after the Viking attacks, and from that position became abbot of St Cyprian in Poitiers in succession to Abbot Reginald.Footnote ²⁴ There is little independent evidence of Bernard's achievements in these offices, but St Cyprian's cartulary refers to him as abbot and art historians tell us that the rebuilding of the abbey church of Saint-Savin, with its remarkable frescoes, dates from the late eleventh century, the period when the vita says that he held office there.Footnote ²⁵

Like Abbot Reginald before him, Bernard promoted the reforms that gathered pace in the Church after the papacy of Gregory vii (1073–85) and he insisted on the strictest monastic observance. In this he would have received support from the diocesan, Bishop Peter ii of Poitiers (1087–1115), who was also a noted advocate of reform.Footnote ²⁶ On occasion Bernard encountered opposition within the communities which he strove to reform, both from those who did not share the same standards of communal observance and from those who wished to continue the old relationships with the secular world. The vita indicates that at Saint-Savin he had supported Abbot Gervase in raising standards of monastic conduct, but he was unable to support Gervase when the abbot sought to secure the revenues of a particular church for the community.Footnote ²⁷ Unwillingness to pursue the traditional revenues that had been commonly used to sustain Benedictine houses indicates the direction of Bernard's thinking, for it shows his interest in the apostolic approach to communal living, which stressed the need to avoid involvement in worldly business and to embrace poverty.Footnote ²⁸

By this stage in his career, moreover, while pursuing higher communal standards, Bernard is portrayed in the vita as experimenting with periods as a hermit. Perhaps his interest had been stimulated by Abbot Reginald's connections with La Chaise-Dieu, or by a friendship with a near neighbour at Saint-Savin, Peter of l'Etoile, whose oratory dedicated to St Julian became the focal point of a monastery at Fontgombault on the River Creuse.Footnote ²⁹ There was no shortage of models,Footnote ³⁰ and an eremetic period may indeed have been expected of those who were experienced monks, for the very first chapter of Benedict's rule describes anchorites or hermits:

During his tenure of the abbacy of St Cyprian, Bernard encountered another figure who was to be influential in the new monasticism, Robert of Arbrissel. At the Council of Poitiers in November 1100 the two men were apparently highly critical of Philip i's marital conduct and were the only members of the council to withstand the displeasure of Duke William ix of Aquitaine (1086–1126), who acted on the king's behalf. Such is the assertion of the vita, although there is no mention of Bernard and Robert in the other sources that cover the council, nor of the incident in either of Robert of Arbrissel's own vitae.Footnote ³² It is quite possible however that Bernard, as a prominent local churchman and advocate of reform, and Robert, a friend of the reforming diocesan, Peter of Poitiers, might well have been vocal in reaffirming the king's excommunication, since the development of canon law on marriage was one of the outcomes of reform.Footnote ³³

At this point, however, Bernard's hitherto extremely successful career stalled. As abbot of St Cyprian he makes little impact on contemporary sources, which are united only in their observation that he left the house. William of Malmesbury, writing in the 1120s, mentions Bernard's apparently voluntary departure: ‘relicto amplissimarum divitiarum coenobio’,Footnote ³⁴ while the chronicle of Saint-Maixent, also dating from the mid-1120s, comments specifically on Bernard's resignation: ‘Anno millesimo centesimo … Obiit quoque Rainaldus, abba Sancti Cipriani, cui successit Bernardus qui reliquit abbatiam.’Footnote ³⁵ These laconic observations suggest that Abbot Bernard's departure from St Cyprian was a great cause célèbre of the day, so well-known at the time that it needed no amplification. The events that led up to it, however, can now be reconstructed only with difficulty.

The first piece of evidence is a letter sent by Pope Pascal ii to Bishop Peter of Poitiers, in which he instructs the bishop to deprive the ‘abbot of the Poitevin monastery of St Cyprian’ of his office and castigates the bishop for permitting the appointment without the approval of the abbot of Cluny.Footnote ³⁶ The letter is undated, so it is not possible to know how quickly this challenge to Bernard's appointment was made, but it is clear, both from the vita and from the independent testimony of Orderic Vitalis, that Bernard resisted it in the papal court itself at Rome.Footnote ³⁷ In the years after Pope Urban's visit to France in the mid-1090s there was increasing reliance on papal justice, so Bernard's recourse to the papal court is not surprising. The time that he had spent at St Cyprian under the leadership of the ‘perorator … eloquentissimus’, Abbot Reginald, had presumably developed Bernard's skills as an advocate, preparing him for the defence of his house, but why did Bernard find himself caught up in an ecclesiastical power struggle in which the abbot of Cluny sought to control the abbey of St Cyprian? Was it simply a manifestation of Cluniac influence that had been increasing in Poitiers throughout the eleventh century? Under Duke William viii (1058–86) a Cluniac foundation, the abbey of Montierneuf, had been established in the north of the city and the pope's letter to Bishop Peter mentions Cluniac interest in another Poitevin abbey, that of Maillezais.Footnote ³⁸ Their claims over St Cyprian went back at least to the tenth century, when Abbo of Fleury had referred to Abbot Odo of Cluny's ditio or authority over the Poitevin house,Footnote ³⁹ and they may have sought simply to seize their moment.

This interpretation is supported by a passage inserted into the early folios of the cartulary of St Cyprian. It appears with others between folios 8 and 21 and, like them, does not fit in with the geographical arrangement of the cartulary.Footnote ⁴⁰ Its editor remarks that it was ‘écrite avec négligence’, and its drafting and position seem therefore to indicate some disorder and uncertainty in the community around the turn of the eleventh and twelfth centuries.Footnote ⁴¹ In it the achievements of Abbot Reginald's abbacy are outlined, including his resistance to Cluniac ambitions and a successful law suit against Marmoutier that supports his reputation as a famous advocate. On his death and while he was yet unburied, Bernard was hurriedly elected in his place, but his election was challenged by the Cluniacs who had recently taken papal advice. Bernard then set off for Cluny, where he informed the abbot and community that he was going to Rome to reply to these objections. He pleaded his case before the pope but without effect and returned to Poitiers, where he realised that he would be unable to sustain the challenge and withdrew into the wilderness. Footnote ⁴²

Such is the account in the St Cyprian cartulary, but the vita provides an additional dimension, for in its picture of Bernard's abbacy at St Cyprian, there is a description of how a disaffected element within the monastery resented Bernard's apostolic approach and sought to undermine him: ‘Overflowing with love, he began to admit everyone into the house and to lead the poor and humble to God. The monks, however, were lukewarm or cold, and more anxious about their present life than their future. From envy opposition began to develop and they said that the monastery lacked the means to accept so many.’ Footnote ⁴³

Attempts were made by this disaffected element to withhold the resources that Bernard used to minister to the poor, and when that failed Bernard's opponents fled to the Cluniacs, providing the material that would revive the eleventh-century attempts to take over St Cyprian.Footnote ⁴⁴ This tension within St Cyprian illustrates a clear dilemma in monasticism at the turn of the eleventh and twelfth centuries. The monastic ideal required that the monks be separate, but Bernard was bringing the external community into the monastery. His opponents may genuinely have preferred the Cluniac approach with its emphasis on a highly developed liturgy, but it was Bernard's interest in the relief of the poor, and his commitment to the apostolic life, that triggered their attempt to bring him down.

Bernard was not at the abbey, but in a period of eremetical retreat when the news of his deposition was received, for the vita indicates that the monks sought him out with an episcopal mandate.Footnote ⁴⁵ His response was immediate: he returned briefly to Poitiers and then, accompanied by a few of his closest associates from the wilderness retreat, he took himself to Rome. There he challenged the pope's decision personally and, it seems, bravely, for he appears to have alleged that the pope's decision owed more to his links with Cluny than to the application of the principles of justice. The vita includes a lengthy speech in which Bernard develops an argument against the overbearing powers of the ‘Archabbot’ of Cluny. Here Bernard refers to the pre-eminence of the abbot of Cluny, who controlled appointments to lead its daughter houses, in contrast with the looser ties binding the affiliations which grew up around, for example, La Chaise-Dieu, and later the newer orders. His courage was apparently applauded and at some point someone appears to have quoted Proverbs xxviii. 1, for reference to the righteous man being as confident as a lion found its way into both the vita and Orderic's Ecclesiastical history.Footnote ⁴⁶

The outcome, as presented in the St Cyprian cartulary, is distinctly lower key than the triumph portrayed in the vita. While the cartulary consigns Bernard to the wilderness, acknowledging failure and tacitly alleging a lack of backbone, the vita suggests that Bernard chose not to resume his office when the pope restored it to him, remained for a period at the papal court and then withdrew to the life of a hermit in western Normandy with a papal commission to preach.Footnote ⁴⁷ The cartulary presents the view of a community which Bernard was unable or unwilling to defend against Cluniac pretensions and reflects St Cyprian's disappointment; the vita was written in the house that Bernard eventually established at Tiron, where his later achievements were celebrated and his reputation revered. In the vita therefore Bernard does not beat a retreat into the wilderness; the pope takes an active role in his career and suggests alternative opportunities for him. Paschal recognises a talented individual at the forefront of monastic thinking, whose attempts to implement new ideas are meeting with resistance. The vita presents Bernard's withdrawal to the wilderness in a positive light; he receives a roving commission from Pope Paschal, similar to that offered by Pope Urban to Bernard's friend, Robert of Arbrissel, so that Bernard's talents can be used in the service of reform.Footnote ⁴⁸ The implication of the vita is that the pope removed Bernard from his old-fashioned community at St Cyprian because he was too good for it, and there is even a hint, in its account of Bernard's role at the Council of Poitiers, that his outspoken advocacy of reform had offended the local potentate, Duke William.

In the opening years of the twelfth century then, Bernard found himself in an almost unique position. Although he remained a respected figure, he was an abbot without a house. He had progressed within the ecclesiastical establishment, but he had failed in his attempts to implement the more advanced apostolic thinking that was being explored in the eremetical experiments of his friends, Vitalis of Mortain and Robert of Arbrissel. Although Bernard might appear to be one of the wandering monks castigated at the beginning of the Benedictine rule, his period in the wilderness gave him time to rethink and to find his space and his patron. The lesson seemed to be that, while charismatic figures, such as Walter of Lesterps, Robert of Turlande and latterly Peter of L'Etoile and Vitalis of Mortain, attracted followers and might eventually set up religious houses, it was hard to import their thinking into established communities. Advanced thinking apparently required new communities, yet even that was not without its risks, for Robert of Arbrissel had already made one unsuccessful attempt to institutionalise his approach when he had tried and failed to lead a community of canons at La Roe.Footnote ⁴⁹

Orderic Vitalis's account provides no details of this period of Bernard's life, stating simply that ‘after long wandering’ he settled in the vicinity of Chartres, but the vita places him in western Normandy, living on the Iles de Chausey and preaching in Coutances against the twin evils identified by eleventh-century reformers, clerical marriage and simony.Footnote ⁵⁰ Again there is no independent evidence to corroborate this assertion, but it is interesting that Adam de Port, one of the benefactors of the Tironensian order in England, originated from the area, and Henry i of England (1100–35), who later supported Bernard, had been count of the Cotentin at the turn of the eleventh and twelfth centuries.Footnote ⁵¹ The vita's next image is of a community settling around Bernard at Chenedet in the forest of Fougères:Footnote ⁵² ‘When it became known by word of mouth that he would not return to St Cyprian, nor to his dwelling on the island, which was unpopular with everyone because of the difficulty of access and departure, many began to flock to him, wishing to be instructed by his teaching and strengthened from the example of his life.’Footnote ⁵³

Although Bernard, the hermit and teacher, was now more accessible, space and patron were still not yet appropriate. The vita tells us that the local lord, Ralph of Fougères, was anxious about the community's effect on the hunting in his forest, and sent Bernard to a site not far from Savigny, where Vitalis of Mortain had already established a cell. For Bernard, and probably for Vitalis too, this was unacceptable and Bernard began to search for another patron. He opened negotiations with Rotrou, count of Mortagne, son-in-law of Henry i of England and one of the members of the first crusading expedition to Jerusalem.Footnote ⁵⁴ Rotrou, who was increasingly calling himself count of the Perche, offered Bernard a place to settle in the Perche at Arcisses (Eure-et-Loir, cant. Nogent-le-Rotrou, comm. Brunelles), some five kilometres north-east of the comital stronghold of Nogent-le-Rotrou.Footnote ⁵⁵ Although the settlement process would be far from straightforward, it was in the Perche that Bernard eventually established Tiron, the community in which he would pursue the monastic ideal he had failed to instil at St Cyprian.

The vita is at pains to portray the virtues of a holy man, but it cannot disguise the important part played in Bernard's career by the local elite that supported him. Negotiation took place between Bernard and the lords who controlled the localities, and there is even a hint that these patrons may have competed for the favours of the holy man. Bernard left the protection of Ralph of Fougères to enter that of Count Rotrou of Mortagne, and he had other noble patrons.Footnote ⁵⁶ Countess Adela of Blois, the daughter of William the Conqueror, attempted to persuade Bernard to a new site, and by the time of his death in 1116 Bernard had attracted royal patronage, as well as a popular following.Footnote ⁵⁷ Both Louis vi of France and Henry i of England made gifts to his foundation, while David, brother and eventual successor of the Scottish king, Alexander i (1107–24), came to Tiron to visit Bernard.Footnote ⁵⁸ Kings and princes had always sought the advice of holy men;Footnote ⁵⁹ Simon of Crépy, after his entry into religion, had promoted peace between William the Conqueror and his eldest son, Robert Curthose, while Vitalis of Mortain would try to reconcile Curthose and Henry i before the battle of Tinchebrai.Footnote ⁶⁰ Robert of Turlande had succeeded in securing the patronage of the lords of the Auvergne for La Chaise-Dieu, yet Bernard, like his friend, Robert of Arbrissel, seems to have been particularly adept at building relations with local magnates and attracting the attention of the mighty.Footnote ⁶¹

The warmth of these relationships is perhaps surprising. All the accounts of Bernard's activities stress that he attracted large numbers of followers, although at no point do they commit to numbers, and the presence of large and unstable populations within a locality can only have unnerved local magnates.Footnote ⁶² Ralph of Fougères's discomfort is described in the vita and he took action to manage the hermit population by relocating Bernard's part of it.Footnote ⁶³ Other lords seem to have admired Bernard the man, but misunderstood the nature of the new approach. The initial attempt made by Count Rotrou of the Perche to support Bernard was inappropriate, for he offered him a well-appointed site with every amenity, while the vita asserts that Bernard preferred the harsher conditions of the undeveloped forest, where the community of Tiron was eventually established.Footnote ⁶⁴ In a gesture reminiscent of Peter Damian's attempt to express his admiration for the monks of Fonte Avellosa, the count of Nevers offered Tiron a great vase, which was presumably intended for liturgical use. Nobles' gifts of gold and plate to monastic communities were not unusual and were one of the traditional ways in which the community's intercession could be purchased and religious ritual embellished.Footnote ⁶⁵ This was not the right thing for Bernard's house, however, for he sought to escape the worldly temptation of wealth; the vase was sold to sustain the community during the great famine of 1110.Footnote ⁶⁶

All this makes it abundantly clear that Bernard, despite his ‘troubled and varied career’, was more than able to operate within contemporary power structures. He had functioned as a prior and abbot of important and well-established houses and he had won the praise of a pope. Although the equilibrium of his career was disturbed by tensions with some members of the communities that he led and through them with the Cluniacs, Bernard was an eleventh-century career churchman and skills appropriate to that career are apparent. He retained close ties with his diocesans, Peter of Poitiers and Ivo of Chartres, and above all Bernard knew how to deal with nobles. He easily reached an understanding with Count Rotrou of the Perche, and the vita describes how the countess Beatrix, mother of Count Rotrou, settled at Tiron in her retirement. After her death her daughter, Juliana, lived there in the house that the countess-dowager had built.Footnote ⁶⁷ This is reminiscent of the unreformed Anglo-Saxon Church, where noblewomen might live with religious communities, but even more of the empress Matilda's close association with the monks of Bec at Notre-Dame du Pré in Rouen.Footnote ⁶⁸ Finally, Bernard was content to accept royal hospitality, visiting Henry i in Normandy, and did not disdain to baptise the sons of the king of France at Tiron.Footnote ⁶⁹

So what was new about Bernard's approach? He had spent some time in the western parts of Normandy; might he have been influenced by Celtic traditions? Could his approach be a descendant of the Celtic ascetism which Julia Smith contrasts with Carolingian authority?Footnote ⁷⁰ Many of the practices described in the vita are reminiscent of the spirituality of the Celtic monks; Bernard is not depicted in prayer up to his neck in water in the manner of St Cuthbert, but he did live on an island and search out roots for his food.Footnote ⁷¹ He could also be described as a wandering preacher like the peregrini, the Irish monks who contributed to the Merovingian missions.Footnote ⁷² Bernard's personal ascetism is not in doubt; he was interested in the imitation of Christ, the apostolic life of poverty and the route to God with the least worldly distraction.Footnote ⁷³ By the turn of the twelfth century however these interests were becoming mainstream, and his career mirrors those of several other conscientious eleventh-century ecclesiastics, who sought personal and institutional revitalisation in the ascetic tradition. There is therefore no hint that Bernard was suspected of heresy. While Marbod of Rennes might express reservations about Robert of Arbrissel's practices and Bernard's protector, Ivo of Chartres, might be ambivalent towards another wavering monk, Bernard did not fall foul of the episcopal authorities in the same way as Henry of Lausanne.Footnote ⁷⁴ Bernard had condemned the behaviour of the married priests at Coutances, but his preaching did not raise popular resentment against the clergy, as did Henry's at Le Mans in the 1110s and other sites for the next thirty years.Footnote ⁷⁵ Bernard's background as a career churchman perhaps enabled him to deal on equal terms with bishops and to explain his thinking. He was, in the end, in and of the ecclesiastical establishment and so presented no challenge to the hierarchy.

Bernard's contribution to reform was to insist on improved discipline: clergy should not be married; monastic communities should not hold parish church revenues; the individual monk needed to discipline himself and in self-denial achieve his route to God. There is little that is radically new here, but he must have delivered it with a verve and force that impressed his contemporaries.Footnote ⁷⁶ We know about the power of Bernard's oratory from the effect he had in the papal curia, when the pope himself was moved, and his preaching appears to have carried similar conviction. Bernard clearly possessed a personal charisma that was out of the ordinary. His preaching and above all his personal example seem to have attracted and motivated followers. Just as students were attracted to the great figures of the eleventh-century cathedral schools by the force of their personality and their example,Footnote ⁷⁷ so crowds flocked to Bernard:

The vita shows a charismatic holy man around whom a following had settled in forested and inaccessible locations, but it would be wrong to see Bernard as an ‘alternative’ figure, one who stood outside society and its hierarchies. While he worked among social outcasts and attracted large numbers of followers, he dealt with those followers in entirely conventional ways.Footnote ⁷⁹ Faced with growing numbers of adherents, Bernard was obliged to order their lives and he did so in the only way that he, a career monk, understood – he imposed a rule. The rule as he knew it was not quite appropriate, so he adapted it. He eliminated some of the psalmody and he substituted manual labour.Footnote ⁸⁰ These changes freed his community from dependency on the lay world, but it was also likely that, without the benefit of the spiritual revenues available to Benedictine communities, they were necessary for survival in a woodland environment. Contemporary commentators are agreed on the contrast between the increasing numbers of Bernard's followers and the meagreness of their endowments. It seems plain, however, that, as numbers grew, new communities would need to be established before their immediate environment became exhausted. This might perhaps account for the rapid spread of Tironensians, for there is evidence of communities in the Perche and Poitou well before Pope Calixtus' confirmation in 1119.Footnote ⁸¹ Thus a network of communities evolved not unlike that which had grown up in emulation of La Chaise-Dieu, where Bernard's former mentor, Abbot Reginald, had received his monastic formation.

Bernard and others such as Robert of Arbrissel or Vitalis of Mortain established communities for their followers, but the second generation was a crucial turning point. Where Cîteaux, for example, was blessed with an organiser in Stephen Harding for its second abbot, Tiron's second abbot is known only by name, Hugh, and as the twelfth century passed, the community appears to have lost some of its appeal. The Cistercian order continued to attract individuals of the highest calibre and in the formidable personality of Bernard of Clairvaux it had, among much else, a publicist of no mean talent. The Savignac order was marginally more successful than Tiron because it attracted the support of King Stephen of England, but it eventually amalgamated with the Cistercians. Fontevraud's formula was novel and its royal connections spectacular – first the French queen, Bertrada de Montfort, and then her descendants, the Angevin kings of England. Tiron, meanwhile, faltered. Without its charismatic leader it was simply one more monastic foundation. In modern marketing parlance its ‘brand’ was not distinctive. Although it produced its founder's vita and his tomb received royal visitors in the early days after his death, the vita was not widely disseminated in the Middle Ages, and it is likely that it survived only in a manuscript preserved at Tiron itself. ‘The links of causality’ for which Dom David Knowles searched the vita in vain are perhaps supplied by viewing Bernard of Abbeville as a career churchman of great talent and personality, whose interest in the apostolic approach alienated some members of the well-established community he led at Poitiers, forcing him to leave and seek a new patron who could guarantee the conditions he required for his particular experiment in communal living.