a medieval foundation
Around the year 1010, Geoffroy, Lord of Sablé, donated the church of Solesmes, together with the associated farm, to the monks of La Couture Abbey in Le Mans. This marked the founding of our monastery.
We possess a 15th-century copy of the charter in which Geoffroy solemnly attests to this donation (photo above), having it signed by the bishops of Le Mans and Angers, and later by King William the Conqueror of England. We read the text of this charter every year in the refectory on 12 October, the anniversary, according to oral tradition, of the dedication of our abbey church.
Before the monastery was founded, there was a parish in Solesmes, possibly established in the 5th century, but more likely in the 6th or 7th century. This church was surrounded by a vast cemetery. We still preserve sarcophagi that may date back to the Merovingian period.
During the 12th century, a lord of Sablé who had taken part in the Crusades brought back from the Holy Land a thorn from Christ’s Crown of Thorns. He entrusted its safekeeping to the monastery of Solesmes. The presence of this distinguished relic of the Lord’s Passion was to prove decisive for the monastery’s subsequent history, and it is no coincidence that it features at the centre of its coat of arms. Indeed, the relic attracted crowds and ensured the monastery’s renown and prosperity.
The Hundred Years’ War, however, put an end to this prosperity: in 1425, the monastery was burnt down by the English and the village lay in ruins. The monks rebuilt their church, but on a more modest scale than the original building: the side aisles and the first bay of the nave were not rebuilt. The current façade of our abbey church dates from this reconstruction.
