A year after he was made Bishop of Tours, Saint Martin of Tours established a small hermitage on this site in the year 372. It is located in a tranquil location at the foot of a cliff near the Loire River.
The hermitage developed quickly and soon became a prestigious abbey with considerable influence. It was attacked by Muslims in 732, and pillaged by Normans in 853. They murdered over 100 monks in the process.
In 982, the abbey was restored by Majolus of Cluny, Abbot of Cluny, at the instance of Eudes I, Count of Blois and of Tours, who died a monk at Marmoutier.
During the years shortly after 1000 CE, the abbey grew considerably and became one of the wealthiest in Europe.
In the wake of the Norman Conquest in 1066, the abbey acquired patronage of churches in England.
In 1096, Pope Urban II consecrated its new chapel and preached the First Crusade.
Pope Calixtus II preached a second crusade in 1119, one year after the Knights Templar were founded, and convinced Count Foulques V d'Anjou to take part resulting in subsequent Foulques' role as King of Jerusalem.
In 1162 Pope Alexander III, who came to reside in Tours after being chased from Rome by Frederick Barbarossa, consecrated the monastery's new Chapel Saint Benoit.
The abbey eventually grew too small for its inhabitants, and was completely rebuilt at the start of the thirteenth century under the leadership of Abbot Hugues des Roches.
Work was periodically interrupted by violent attacks made by the counts of Blois on the monks.
In 1253, Louis IX took the abbey under his protection, and in the following century, its abbot, Gérard du Puy, became cardinal-nephew to the last of the Avignon popes, Gregory XI.
In 1562 the abbey was again pillaged, this time by Huguenot Protestants at the start of the Wars of Religion, but recovered again.
The abbey was disestablished in 1799 during the French Revolution.
Adapted from Wikpedia
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