Historical Timeline of Mont Saint Michel

Mont Saint-Michel’s recorded history runs more than 1,300 years, from a bishop’s oratory in 708 to a working monastic community today. This timeline holds the dates that shaped the rock.

The Timeline

708 — Tradition holds that the Archangel Michael appeared to Bishop Aubert of Avranches, who built the first oratory on the rock then called Mont Tombe; it was dedicated in 709.

966 — Duke Richard I of Normandy installed Benedictine monks, founding the abbey that held the Mont for the next eight centuries.

1023 — Construction of the Romanesque abbey church began on the summit, the building at the heart of everything that followed; its millennium was marked in 2023.

1204 to 1228 — After a fire during the French seizure of Normandy, the abbey built La Merveille, the three-story Gothic monastery on the north face, with funding from King Philip Augustus.

1421 to 1434 — The Romanesque choir collapsed in 1421 with the Hundred Years’ War at the walls; the English assaulted and failed in 1434, and the Mont never fell. The Flamboyant Gothic choir replaced the ruin through the later 1400s.

1469 — King Louis XI founded the Order of Saint Michael, France’s royal order of chivalry, seated at the Mont.

1791 to 1863 — The Revolution expelled the monks and turned the abbey into a prison that held some 14,000 inmates before Napoleon III closed it.

1874 and 1897 — France listed the abbey as a historic monument and began restoration; the new spire of 1897 raised Frémiet’s gilded Saint Michael over the bay.

1944 — American troops reached the Mont on August 1 during the Normandy breakout; it came through the war untouched.

1966 to 2001 — Monastic life returned for the abbey’s millennium, Benedictines from 1969, and the Monastic Fraternities of Jerusalem, who keep daily services today, from 2001.

1979 — UNESCO inscribed Mont Saint-Michel and its bay on the first French list of World Heritage sites.

2009 and 2014 — The dam on the Couesnon and the new footbridge replaced the silting causeway and restored the Mont’s tides; our tides page covers the result.

Frequently Asked Questions

How old is Mont Saint-Michel?
The first sanctuary dates to 708, the Benedictine abbey to 966, and the church on the summit to 1023, giving the site more than 1,300 years of recorded history.

Was Mont Saint-Michel ever conquered?
No. The English besieged and assaulted it during the Hundred Years’ War and never took it, the only fortress in this part of France that held out through the war.

Do monks still live at Mont Saint-Michel?
Yes. The Monastic Fraternities of Jerusalem, brothers and sisters, have lived in the abbey since 2001 and hold daily services open to visitors.