Odo of Cluny

Odo of Cluny (c. 878 at Le Mans, † November 18 942 in Tours ) was the second abbot of the Benedictine abbey of Cluny and initiated the Cluniac reform of monasteries. He was canonized in 1407.

Church History circumstances of the time

Life

Odo was initially squire at the court of William of Aquitaine. After joining the Benedictine Order in the year 909, he studied in Tours and Paris. He was ordained in the Benedictine Baume- les -Messieurs priest. 925 he was appointed the third abbot of Aurillac, but the post had to fill by his coadjutor and successor, Arnulf.

After the death of the first abbot Berno Odo 927 took over the sole management of the 910 built and until then Baume controlled from Cluny. He was responsible for the strict observance of monastic rules, introduced a strict discipline of silence and strict asceticism. Odo reached against resistance monastic dignitaries, but with the approval of the nobles and the Holy See that numerous monasteries of Cluny was assumed. Thus, the influence of the reform ideas grew.

Odo was in addition to the religious duties taste for music, he composed hymns and composed music-theoretical writings, including the Dialogus de musica, in which he introduced the now common tone letters as names of the tones of the diatonic tonal system of Euclid, which he knew about Boethius.

Remembrance

Feast day of the saint is November 18. Odo is the patron saint of musicians. He is called in prayer for rain and drought.

Iconography

Odo is represented as abbot with book while operating Armer.

Works

• Anne -Marie Bultot - Verleysen (ed.): Vita sancti Geraldi Auriliacensis - Vita prolixior fine. Series: Subsidia Hagiographica No. 89, Édition critique, traduction française, introduction et commentaires; Société des Bollandistes, Bruxelles, 1989, ISBN 2-87365-023-0.
• Dialogus de musica. In: Gerbert Scriptores. I, pp. 251-264.