Fulda Monastery of

Fulda Monastery Of, a celebrated convent, established in 744 by Boniface, and one of his pupils named Sturm. The latter, a young man of good familv, having decided on becoming a hermit, was sent by Boniface to search out a spot in the forest of Buchonia, secure from the inroads of the Saxons. Sturm set out with two companions, and finally selected a plot of land on the banks of the Fulda, which was given them by duke Karlmann. In January, 744, Sturm and seven companions took possession, and immediately commenced improving and building. The convent was organized on the plan of Monte Cassino, after the rule of St. Benedict, and Sturm became its first abbot. In November 4, 751, pope Zachariah exempted it from episcopal jurisdiction. The convent prospered rapidly, its inmates numbering 400 before Sturm's death in 779. Its prosperity still increased under Sturm's successor, Bangulf. Both Pepin the Short and Charlemagne were very liberal towards this convent, which in its turn did great good in disseminating the knowledge of agriculture as well as literature throughout the surrounding country. Its celebrated theological school was particularly prosperous under Rabanus Maurus, who afterwards became abbot of Fulda. There were twelve seniors or sub-instructors, and the scholars were instructed in grammar, rhetoric, dialectics, theology, and the German language. Nor were either fine or mechanical arts overlooked, for the convent produced both clever artists and talented artisans. Under the abbot Werner (968 to 982), Fulda became the first among the abbeys of Germany and France. Otto I named its abbots arch-chancellors of the empire. In 1331 the duke John of Ziegenhein led the citizens of Fulda to assault the convent, but the assailants were overpowered and their leaders put to death. The Reformation at first made an impression in the convent, but abbot Balthasar succeeded in 1573 in checking the progress of evangelical doctrines within its walls. In 1631 Fulda was subjected to Sweden, and an attempt was made to introduce Protestantism into the district, but, after the defeat of Nordlingen, the Roman Catholic abbots resumed their sway. In 1809, Fulda, which six years before had become a principality of the prince of Orange, was by Napoleon I annexed to the grand-duchy of Frankfort, but Prussia finally joined it in 1815 to the electorate of Hesse-Cassel, of which it remained a part until the incorporation of that country, in 1866, with Prussia. See Brower, Antiq. Fuld. lib. 4 (Antwerp, 16); Dronke,

Traditiones et Antiquitates Fuldenses (Fulda, 1844); Niedner, Zeitschrift f. hist. Theol. (1846); Herzog, Real-Encyklop. 4:624; McLear, Christian Missions in the Middle Ages, page 214.