Maidbronn Abbey

Maidbronn Abbey (German: Kloster Maidbronn; Latin: Fons Virginis Sanctae Mariae) was a Cistercian nunnery in Maidbronn in the present municipality of Rimpar in Bavaria, Germany. It was founded in 1232 by the Bishop of Würzburg in Bergerbrunn (now Rotkreuzhof in Dürrbachtal) but moved after three years to Etzelnhausen, renamed Maidbronn. The spiritual director was the abbot of Ebrach, later the abbot of Langheim. By the 1260s the abbey was flourishing to the extent that it was able to send a contingent of nuns to establish the newly-founded Sonnefeld Abbey. During the rest of the 13th century the building of the church was completed. From the 14th century onwards the abbey was in steady decline, caused mainly by its chronic financial difficulties.