The history of the Cistercians and Aduard Abbey

Introduction
Development
Demolition
Excavations
Village
Infirmary
Medieval bridge
Abbey's sewerage
Miscellaneous

Introduction

In 1192 twelve monks from Klaarkamp abbey near Rinsumageest in the north of Holland went out to a place called Adewerth (Aduard) 'unanimously and in a devoted frame of mind with the intention to build a monastery expecting the Almighty God to approve of it, since he had pointed out where it had to be established.'

These are some lines of a 15th century chronicle that gives roughly the history of Aduard abbey, one of the most powerful and economically successful monasteries ever built on Dutch territory. It was a member of the Cistercian order, one of the most impressive cultural highlights of the Middle Ages. The order was founded 900 years ago in Burgundy in France.

Development

Over the centuries many historian praised the abbey for its achievements in the field of politics and reclamation of land. In the pre-Reformation era it gave great intellectual freedom to a host of scholars generally known as biblical humanists, who stayed on the abbey precincts discussing and exchanging views. This elite group of people including the Groningen-born Wessel Gansford and Rudolf Agricola is often called the 'Aduard circle'.

Figure 1:
Wessel van Gansfort Figure 2:
Rudolph Agricola

Members of the 'Aduard Circle'.
(Source: Effigies & vitae Professorum Academiae Groningae & Omlandiae, 1654)

Already at the beginning of the 13th century the abbey started to found daughter houses in what is now called the province of Groningen and in the north of Germany. Investments in granges were realised near by and far off.


Figure 1: Wessel van Gansfort	Figure 2: Rudolph Agricola
Members of the 'Aduard Circle'. (Source: Effigies & vitae Professorum Academiae Groningae & Omlandiae, 1654)