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 Dwight Peck's personal website
Marlowe's
visit to Switzerland,
June 2003
Abbeys
in Switzerland: Romainmôtier
Newly
graduated from high school, soon to be off to Uni, Marlowe visits the Old Dad
in Switzerland.
You
may not find this terribly rewarding unless you're included here, so this is a
good time for casual and random browsers to turn back before they get too caught
up in the sweep and majesty of the proceedings and can't let go. 
The
tiny village of Romainmôtier
(400 inhabitants) lies in a hole, at 674m, a deep dip in the valley of the little
river Nozon which flows down out of the Swiss Jura at Vaulion, near the Col du
Mollendruz and the Vallée du Joux, as it continues past La Sarraz to reach
Lac de Neuchâtel at Yverdon. The nearest town, Juriens, a kilometre to the
west, is 120m higher up the hill (the village of Envy [!] is just a few hundred
meters up the hill but too small to call a town).
The Hôtel
Au Lieutenant Baillival, a favorite with passing hikers.
An
abbey was established on this spot, traditionally and probably correctly, in 515,
and was turned over to the authority of the new reform-minded abbey of Cluny in
928, one of the first of what came to be a Cluniac franchise or monastery-chain
loosely within the Benedictine order. This is the center of the village (left),
just outside the abbey precincts gatehouse (right), with its 14th century tower
clock, in June 2003.
The present
church was begun at the beginning of the 11th century, on the foundations of buildings
from the 7th and 8th centuries.
The
gatehouse to the abbey precinct (left), Marlowe looking for the tea room (right)
The
front of the church, and archaeologically the oldest part.
The
back side of the church, looking at the gatehouse from the inside.
Feedback and suggestions are welcome if positive, resented if negative,  .
All rights reserved, all wrongs avenged. Posted 21 September 2003, revised 8 March
2008, 30 October 2015.
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