Prüm Abbey

Prüm Abbey is a former Benedictine abbey in Prüm, Lorraine, now in the diocese of Trier (Germany), founded by the Frankish widow Bertrada the elder and her son Charibert, Count of Laon, on 23 June 720. The first abbot was Angloardus.HistoryAbbey's early period up to the 13th centuryBertrada of Prüm's granddaughter was Bertrada the younger, wife of King Pepin the Short (751–68). Prüm became the favourite monastery of the Carolingian dynasty and received large endowments and privileges. Pepin rebuilt the monastery and bestowed great estates upon it by a deed of gift dated 13 August 762. The king brought monks from Meaux under Abbot Assuerus to the monastery.The church, dedicated to the Saviour (Salvator), was not completed until the reign of Charlemagne, and was consecrated on 26 July 799 by Pope Leo III. Charlemagne and succeeding emperors were liberal patrons of the abbey. Several of the Carolingians entered the religious life at Prüm; among these was Charlemagne's illegitimate son Pepin the Hunchback, who was exiled there after an abortive uprising and died there in 811, and Lothair I, who became a monk in 855. His grave was rediscovered in 1860; in 1874, the Emperor Wilhelm I erected a monument over it.