PREM ON STR A TENSES

( Lat. ) In French, Prémontrés . A religious order, founded by St. Norbert, descended from a noble family in the diocese of Cologne. He was educated suitably to his quality, and lived for some time at the emperor Henry the Fifth’s court. At about thirty years of age he was ordained deacon and priest; and, soon after, entering upon a very strict and mortified way of living, he resigned his church preferments, and distributed a large patrimonial estate to the poor. Then he embraced the rule of St. Augustine, and retiring with thirteen companions to a place called Prem on stratum, in the diocese of Laon, in Picardy, he there began his order, about the year 1119. This ground, with the chapel of St. John Baptist, was given to St. Norbert by the bishop of Laon, with the approbation of Louis le Gros, king of France, who gave the Prem on str a tenses a charter of privileges. The place was called Prem on stratum, because it was pretended the Ble ed Virgin herself pointed out (prem onst rav it) this place for the principal house of the order, and at the same time commanded them to wear a white habit. The monks of this order were, at first, so poor, that they had nothing they could call their own but one poor a , which served them to carry wood, which they cut down every morning and sent to Laon, where it was sold to purchase bread. But, in a short time, they received so many donations, and built so many monasteries, that, thirty years after the foundation of this order, they had above one hundred abbeys in France and Germany. The popes and kings of France have granted many privileges, and been very liberal, to the Prem on str a tenses. Besides a great number of saints, who have been canonized, this order has had several persons of distinguished birth, who have been contented with the humble condition of lay-brothers: as, Guy, earl of Brienne; Godfrey, earl of Namur, . It has likewise given the Church a great number of archbishops and bishops. The order of Prem on str a tenses increased so greatly, that it had monasteries in all parts of Christen dom, amounting to 1000 abbeys, 300 provostships, a vast number of priories, and 500 nunneries. These were divided into 30 cyrcaries or provinces. But this number of houses is greatly diminished; for, of 65 abbeys it had in Italy, there is not one remaining at present; not to mention the lo of all their monasteries in Sweden, Norway, Denmark, England, Scotland, and Ireland. These monks, vulgarly called White Canons, came first into England in the year 1146, where their first monastery, called New House, was built in Lincoln shire, by Peter de Saulia, and dedicated to St. Martial is. In the reign of Edward I., when that king granted his protection to the monasteries, the Prem on str a tenses had twenty-seven houses in this kingdom.