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Union, which then consisted of the six abbeys: Bursfeld, Clus, Reinhausen, Cismar in Schlcswig- Holstein, St. Jacob near Mainz, and Huyeburg near Magdeburg. The cardinal likewise decreed tl Abbot of Bursfeld should always ex officio be one of the three presidents of the congregation, and that he should have power to convoke annual chapters. The first annual chapter of the Bursfeld Congrega- tion convened in the monastery of Sts. Peter and Paul at Erfurt in 144(5. In 1 4 ."> 1, while on his journey of reform through Germany, the Cardinal Legate, Nicholas of Cusa, met John of Hagen at "Wurzburg, where the Benedictine monasteries of the Mainz- Bamberg province held their triennial provincial chapter. The legate appointed the Abbot of Burs- feld visitor for this province, and in a bull, dated 7 June, 14.il, the Bursfeld Congregation was approved, and favoured with new privileges. Finally, on 6 March, 1458, Pope Pius II approved the statutes ni the 1 1 >n gregation and gave it all the privileges which Eugene IV had given to the Italian Bene- dictine Congregation of St. Justina since the year 1431. In 1401 this approbation was reiterated, and various new privileges granted to the congre- gation. Favoured by bishops, cardinals, and popes. 11 as by temporal rulers, especially the Dukes of Brunswick, the Bursfeld Congregation exercised a wholesome influence to promote true reform in the Benedictine monasteries of Germany during the second half of the fifteenth, and the first half of the sixteenth, century. At the death of Abbot John of Hagen thirty-six monasteries had already joined the Bursfeld Congregation, and new ones were being added every year. During its most flourishing period, shortly before the Protestant revolt, at least 136 abbeys, scattered through all oi Germany, belonged to the Bursfeld Union. The religious revolution, and especially the con- sequent risings of the peasants in Germany, greatly retarded the progress of the Bursfeld Reform. In 1579, Andrew Luderitz. the last Abbot of Bursfeld, wis driven from his monastery by the Lutheran Duke Julius of Brunswick, and, after an existence of almost five hundred years, Bursfeld ceased to be a Catholic monastery. The possessions of the abbey were confiscated, and the abbot was replaced by an adherent of Luther. About forty other Benedictine abbeys belonging to the Bursfeld Congregation were wrested from the Church, their possessions confiscated by Lutheran princes, and their churches demolished or turned to Protestant uses. Though greatly impeded in its work of reform, the Bursfel 1 Congregation continued to exist until the compulsory secularization of all its monasteries at the end eighteenth, and the beginning of the nineteenth, century. Its last president was Bernard Bierbaum, Abbot of Werden in the Rhine Province, who died in 1798. Bursfeld (Bursfelde) is at present a small village with about 200 inhabitants, for whom a Lutheran minister holds services in the old abbey church.

Trithfmhs, Chronicon Hiraatigienae (St. Gall, 1090), II. 350; I.m i km u>, Antigvitata Bursfeldenees (LeipziR and Wolfenbuttel,. 1703); Evklt, /</■ At ■■:• der /• Benedin [Monster, 1865); Biedeni

..,. Order (Wi imar, - Brookhoff, /'" Kloeter der hi. kath. Kirche tODerbau en . Hhmhithkr, Die Orden und Kongregationen (Paderborn, 1896 . I. 141: I.iNNt.iumN, Die Reform

BenedictinrrkliKier im IS. JaJtrh. durrh die Bury;. Id. r Con- gregation in Studien u. M utheilungen aui dem Benedii Orden, XX-XX1I; Bkhxieke, tee onginea de la congregation de Bursfeld in Revue Benidietme, XVI.

Michael Ott.

Burton, George A. See Clifton, Diocese op.

Bury St. Edmund's, The Abbey of. — The first re- ligious foundation there was established by Sigebert, King of the Fast Angles, who resigned his crown to found a monastery about 637. It became celebrated

when the relics of the martyred King Edmund were brought there in 903, after which time the town, till then called Beodericsworth, became known as St. Edmund's Town or St. Edmund's Bury. During the reign of Canute (1016-35) the secular canons were replaced by Benedictines. In 1095 there was a solemn transla- tion of the saint's relics to the new church built by Abbot Baldwin. The shritii' grew in fame, wealth, and magnificence till the monastery was considered second only to ( ilastonbury, but in 1405 a terrible fire caused irrep- arable loss to the church, from which it never recovered. The abbot had a Beat in Parliament and ■ I full ju- risdiction over the town a a d neighbourhood. There was ac- commodation lor eighty monks. but more than two hundred persons resided in the Abbey. At the dissolution, the revenues were valued at £2,360, equivalent to more than £20,000 in present money. It was in the abbey church that the memorable meeting of barons took place in the year 1214, when Cardinal Langton, Archbishop of Canterbury, stand- ing at the high altar, read out the proposed Charter of Liberties, which in the form of Magna Charts was signed by King John in 1215. The abbey was finally dissolved by Henry VIII in 1539, when the abbey church ami the monastic buildings were in large measure destroyed, the gateway, an ancient

The Norman Tuwkr

Abbey Hill at Present Day

bridge, and other scattered ruins alone now remaining. The fate of the saint's nlies has never been decided, According to one tradition, they were abstracted by Prime Louis of France in 1217. Relics purporting to be those of the saint were long preserved at Tou- louse, until in 1901, Cardinal Vaughan, Archbishop

il Westminster, obtained leave to translate them to England. Doubts having been thrown on the au- thenticity of the relics, a commission of investigation

Was appointed by the Holy See, but no report has been published. Among the famous monks of the Abbey were Abbot Sampson and his chronicler