Pilgrimage You Ask?

[scruffy1]

Cluny is inseparable from the Camino throughout several of it's branches. Sister monasteries owing allegiance to Cluny include those in Vezelay, La Charité-sur-Loire, Conques, Moissac, which sounds like an itinerary for the Vía Lemovicensis – very true - but Cluny also owned and ruled properties in Spain including Roncesvalles, Pamplona, Estella, Najera, Carrión de los Condes, and especially Sahagún –the Spanish Cluny - where only La Iglesia de San Tirso reveals it's past glory. The Camino Francés then is intimately entwined with Cluny. A short introduction which brings us to Pons of Melgueil, the seventh Abbot of Cluny, a most remarkable man until he succumbed to his megalomania and insanity. In the year 1120, Pons made the pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela. "Admittedly he scarcely did it in the spirit of the poor pilgrim, on foot with and staff in hand." (The first indications of his later love for riches and ceremony had already begun to appear), "but rather with a retinue fit for a king." "None the less he did it." "Pons was not by any means alone in making the journey in such a triumphant fashion; the camino…was by now relatively safe, the Moors pushed back south and the bandits by and large removed." "As a result, in addition to being a journey of sincere faith, or in order to do penitence, as a punishment, in the hope of a miraculous healing, because of wanderlust" (who me?) "or for a number of other reasons, the camino was attracting a new breed of pilgrim-the person of high rank enjoying a fashionable exercise in piety by going on a comfortable adventure in foreign parts, and perhaps whitewashing a few sins along the way." Personal conclusions and thoughts may remain your own - everyone makes his/her own pilgrimage while quotations are from In Search of Cluny by Edwin Mullins, Signal Books 2006- highly recommended (!) as is his The Pilgrimage to Santiago Signal Books 1974..

 

[MTtoCamino]

Looks like a visit to the library as the I books do not have it. Thank you for sharing
Keith

 

[Bala]

I love this stuff. Thanks for the insight into Cluny and the Camino. Cluny has long fascinated me, as has the Camino. I just ordered the Camino book (US $0.01 plus s&h) but, yikes! The original hardback of Cluny currently selling on Amazon for $150.00. Will have to hold off til the reprint comes out!

 

[Kanga]

I just love that everything old is new again!

...the camino was attracting a new breed of pilgrim-the person of high rank enjoying a fashionable exercise in piety by going on a comfortable adventure in foreign parts, and perhaps whitewashing a few sins along the way." ... from In Search of Cluny by Edwin Mullins...

Thank you @scruffy1 . It takes a comment about the 12th century to put today into perspective. And no disrespect for anyone travelling in comfort - I do it too, depending on circumstances

 

[Felice]

I love this stuff. Thanks for the insight into Cluny and the Camino. Cluny has long fascinated me, as has the Camino. I just ordered the Camino book (US $0.01 plus s&h) but, yikes! The original hardback of Cluny currently selling on Amazon for $150.00. Will have to hold off til the reprint comes out!

Sigh.... Just had a look at my copy of the Camino book. I paid £3.75 for mine in 1978. It was the start of my interest in the Camino.