St. Ulrich Abbey

The origins of the St. Ulrich Priory date back to the Investiture Controversy. Around 1083, the Cluniac monk Ulrich of Zell founded a priory of the Burgundian abbey on the western edge of the Black Forest. He utilized an already existing monastic community, which had originally been founded before 1072 on the Tuniberg and relocated to Grüningen between 1077 and 1080. This community already had connections to Cluny, established by Hesso von Eichstetten and Margrave Hermann I. Around 1087, at Ulrich's instigation, the monastic community moved again, this time to Zell in the Möhlin Valley, where a cell of the Abbey of St. Gallen had been located as early as 868. The priory acquired property in the vicinity of Zell from Bishop Burkhard von Fenis of Basel and developed into the only Cluniac monastery east of the Rhine. It acquired possessions in Breisgau, Alsace, and Ortenau, including parishes in Grüningen, Wolfenweiler, Bollschweil, and Hochdorf. The monastery's Vogt changed hands between the Counts of Nimburg, the Bishops of Strasbourg, Staufer kings, the Counts of Freiburg, and the Austrian Dukes. In the 13th century, the monastic community experienced a decline with only a few monks remaining.