Remiremont

Remiremont: abbey church

Remiremont, town, Vosges département, Grand Est région, eastern France. It lies along the Moselle River near the latter’s confluence with the Moselotte and is surrounded by wooded heights. Remiremont (Romaraci Mons) is named after St. Romaric, a companion of St. Columban at Luxeuil, who in the 7th century founded a monastery and a convent on the hills above the present town. In 910 an invasion of the Hungarians drove the convent’s nuns down to Remiremont, which had grown around a villa of the Frankish kings. Settling there, the nuns (called the Ladies of Remiremont) were enriched by European rulers and attained great power, their abbess becoming a princess of the Holy Roman Empire. Their dominion was not terminated until the War of the Escutcheons (1564) between the duke of Lorraine and the abbess. The monastery and nunnery were suppressed during the French Revolution. The abbey church, dating mainly from the 14th to 15th century, has an 11th-century crypt. The former palace of the abbesses, which now contains the town hall, was rebuilt in 1752 and again in 1871. Remiremont’s industries include textile and clothing manufacturing, embroidering, iron and copper founding, and brewing. Pop. (1999) 8,540; (2014 est.) 7,768.