An abbey is a type of monastery used by members of a religious order under the governance of an abbot or abbess. Abbeys provides a complex of buildings and land for religious activities, work, and housing of Christian monks and nuns.
A monastery is a building or complex of buildings comprising the domestic quarters and workplaces of monastics, monks or nuns, whether living in communities or alone (hermits). A monastery generally includes a place reserved for prayer which may be a chapel, church, or temple, and may also serve as an oratory, or in the case of communities anything from a single building housing only one senior and two or three junior monks or nuns, to vast complexes and estates housing tens or hundreds. A monastery complex typically comprises a number of buildings which include a church, dormitory, cloister, refectory, library, balneary and infirmary. Depending on the location, the monastic order and the occupation of its inhabitants, the complex may also include a wide range of buildings that facilitate self-sufficiency and service to the community. These may include a hospice, a school, and a range of agricultural and manufacturing buildings such as a barn, a forge, or a brewery.
The festival and spa town of Bad Hersfeld is the district seat of the Hersfeld-Rotenburg district in northeastern Hesse, Germany, roughly 50 km southeast of Kassel.
The Michaeliskirche or St. Michaelis Kirche in the Thuringian town of Ohrdruf was the site of Johann Sebastian Bach's first employment.
Saint Wigbert, (Wihtberht) born in Wessex around 675, was an Anglo-Saxon Benedictine monk and a missionary and disciple of Saint Boniface who travelled with the latter in Frisia and northern and central Germany to convert the local tribes to Christianity. His feast day is August 13.
Saint Lullus was the first permanent archbishop of Mainz, succeeding Saint Boniface, and first abbot of the Benedictine Hersfeld Abbey.
Ohrdruf is a small town in the district of Gotha in the German state of Thuringia. It lies some 30 km southwest of Erfurt at the foot of the northern slope of the Thuringian Forest. The former municipalities Crawinkel, Gräfenhain and Wölfis were merged into Ohrdruf in January 2019.
Niederaltaich Abbey is a house of the Benedictine Order founded in 731, situated in the village of Niederalteich on the Danube in Bavaria.
Mosbach Abbey was a Benedictine monastery, later a monastery of Augustinian Canons, in the town of Mosbach in the Odenwald, Baden-Württemberg, Germany.
St. Georgenberg Abbey is a Benedictine monastery, the oldest extant monastery in the Tyrol, founded in 1138 but from 1708 to 2019 removed to the nearby city of Fiecht in the community of Vomp in Tyrol, Austria. In 2019 the monks returned to a restored abbey at St, Georgenberg, which had remained a place of pilgrimage and spiritual retreat.
Liessies Abbey was a Benedictine monastery in the village of Liessies, near Avesnes-sur-Helpe, in the Archdiocese of Cambrai and the département of Nord, France.
St. Maximin's Abbey was a Benedictine monastery in Trier in the Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany.
Hersfeld Abbey was an important Benedictine imperial abbey in the town of Bad Hersfeld in Hesse, Germany, at the confluence of the rivers Geisa, Haune and Fulda.
Philippsthal (Werra) is a market community in Hersfeld-Rotenburg district in eastern Hesse, Germany, right at the boundary with Thuringia.
St. Ulrich's and St. Afra's Abbey, Augsburg is a former Benedictine abbey dedicated to Saint Ulrich and Saint Afra in the south of the old city in Augsburg, Bavaria.
Memleben Abbey was a Benedictine monastery in Memleben on the Unstrut river, today part of the Kaiserpfalz municipality in Saxony-Anhalt, Germany. The convent, now ruined, was established by Emperor Otto II and his consort Theophanu about 979.
St. Matthias' Abbey is a Benedictine monastery in Trier, Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany.
Saalfeld Abbey was an important medieval Benedictine monastery and Imperial Abbey in Saalfeld, Thuringia, Germany. As an imperial abbey, the monastery was under the direct auspices of the Holy Roman Emperor, and enjoyed a degree of sovereignty equivalent to a small micro state within the Empire. The monastery was founded in 1071 and existed until 1526, when it was secularised during the Reformation.
