FONTEVRAULT, or Fontevraud, in Latin Fons Εbraldi, a town of France, with a population of about 2500, in the department of Maine-et-Loire, 10 miles S.E. of Saumur, and 2 miles from the confluence of the Loire and Vienne. It is situated in the midst of a forest district, and the inhabitants carry on various minor industries fostered by the timber trade. The interest of the place centres in its abbey, which since 1804 has been utilized and abused as a central house of detention for convicts. In spite of mutilation and “translation,” the building remains a fine example of the architecture of the 12th century. The church, of which only the choir and apse are appropriated to divine service, has a beautiful nave covered by four cupolas. In a chapel in the south transept are the effigies of Henry II. of England and his wife Eleonora of Guienne, and of Richard the Lion Heart and John’s wife Isabella of Angoulême—Eleanora’s being of oak and the rest of stone. The second court of the abbey contains a remarkable building, which long went under the misnomer of chapelle funéraire, but was in reality the old kitchen. Details and diagrams will be found in Viollet-le-Duc’s Dictionnaire de Γ Architecture. There are three stories, of which the first is an octagon, the second a square, and the third an octagon; and the whole is surmounted by a sort of pyramidal structure. Fontevrault was founded about the end of the 11th century by Robert of Arbrissel, who was born in the village of Arbrissel or Arbresec, in the diocese of Rennes, and attained great fame as a preacher and ascetic. It consisted of a nunnery for virgins and widows, a magdaleneum, a hospital for lepers and other diseased folk, a convent, and a church. The church was used both by the monks and the nuns, but no ...