Richer of Senones

Richer of Senones (sometimes in French: Richer le Lorrain) (circa 1190–1266) was a monk and chronicler of Senones Abbey in Lorraine, a traveller and one of the very few chroniclers or historians of the Vosges whose works have survived complete.

He was born probably around 1190, quite possibly in the Val de Lièpvre (now in Haut-Rhin), perhaps a younger son of an Alsatian or Lotharingian noble family. He studied at Strasbourg and was admitted to Senones Abbey under abbot Henri (1202–1225). In about 1218 Richer was sent as an ambassador of Senones to Würzburg when Theobald I, Duke of Lorraine, was prisoner of Emperor Frederick II, after the fire of Nancy and the siege of Amance.

He travelled extensively throughout the Vosges, which he knew extremely well, and throughout Alsace and Lorraine, where he often encountered monks from Lièpvre Priory as well as monks from St. Denis' Abbey in Paris, who had possessions in the Val de Lièpvre. He visited St. Denis' Abbey himself in 1223, probably together with monks from Lièpvre. He often visited the castles of Bilstein in Urbeis and Échéry in Sainte Croix-aux-Mines, as well as the renowned castle of Bernstein. He also knew Gorze Abbey,St. Evre's Abbey, Toul, and the abbey at Saint-Dié.

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