Affligem Abbey

Affligem Abbey (Dutch: Abdij Affligem, French: Abbaye d'Affligem) is a Benedictine abbey in the historic village of Hekelgem, now in the municipality of Affligem, Flemish Brabant, Belgium, 19 km (12 mi) to the north-west of Brussels. Dedicated in 1086, it was the most important monastery in the Duchy of Brabant and therefore often called Primaria Brabantiae.

On 28 June 1062, an hermitical fraternity was founded in Affligem by six knights who repented of their violent way of life. Hermann II, Count Palatine of Lotharingia (1061–1085) and his guardian, Anno II, archbishop of Cologne (d. 1075) donated the foundation grounds. On this land, the first abbey church, dedicated to Saint Peter, was erected in 1083. The Benedictine Rule was adopted in 1085, followed by the formal dedication of the abbey in 1086.

The first abbot of the abbey was Fulgentius (1088–1122), a monk of Saint-Vanne Abbey in Verdun, originally from Frasnes, in Walloon Brabant. John Cotton, whose De musica (c. 1100-1121) is one of the earliest musical theses, is also referred to as ' Johannes Affligemensis' because he dedicated De musica to abbot Fulgentius.

The counts of Brabant, also counts of Leuven, became their protectors (Vögte) in 1085/1086. A number of their family members are buried in the abbey church, including Queen Adeliza of England (d. 1151), as well as her father Duke Godfrey I of Leuven (d. 1139). Queen Adeliza was buried in the abbey church in 1151, near the clockwork.

During the 12th century, the abbey became known for the strict adoption of the Cluniac observance. Several monasteries were founded by the monks of Affligem or assigned to the abbot of Affligem by their founder. Maria Laach Abbey in the Rhineland-Palatinate in Germany, was founded in 1093 as a priory of Affligem by the first Count Palatine of the Rhine Heinrich II von Laach and his wife Adelaide of Weimar-Orlamünde, widow of Hermann II of Lotharingia. Bernard of Clairvaux visited Affligem in 1146, where it is said his greeting to the Blessed Virgin was miraculously answered. In memory of this event, he donated his staff and chalice to the abbey (still preserved in the abbey).

In 1523, Affligem joined the Bursfelde Congregation, a union of Benedictine monasteries formed in the 15th century for the stricter observance of the Benedictine rule. In 1569, the Archbishop of Mechelen became secular abbot and the spiritual duty was exercised by a provost (praepositus), a measure that lasted until the dissolution of the abbey in 1796. In 1580 the abbey was destroyed by soldiers of William the Silent, but subsequently rebuilt.

Archbishop Jacobus Boonen introduced the Monte Cassino observance. At his insistence, the Prior of Affligem, Benedict van Haeften, founded in 1627 a new congregation, B. M. V. in Templo Praesentata, which included Affligem and several other Belgian monasteries, affiliated to the Congregation of St. Vanne, which had a stricter constitution than Bursfeld. It was dissolved in 1654. Haeften commissioned Rubens and De Crayer to decorate the church and the monastery in Affligem.

In 1796, during the French occupation, the monks were chased away from the abbey, part of the buildings destroyed and the lands confiscated. The last provost, Beda Regaus, preserved the miraculous image of Our Lady, as well as the staff and chalice of Saint Bernard. These came into the possession of a Benedictine monk, Veremund Daens, who in 1838 established a new foundation at Dendermonde.