Gyrovagues (sometimes Gyrovagi or Gyruvagi) were wandering
monks without fixed residence or leadership who relied on charity and the hospitality of others. The term is used to refer to a kind of monks, rather than a specific order, and may be pejorative as they are almost universally denounced by
Christian writers of the
Early Middle Ages. They were denounced as wretched by
Benedict of Nursia, who accused them of indulging their passions and cravings.
Augustine called them Circumcelliones and attributed the selling of fake
relics as their innovation.
Cassian also mentions a class of monk which may have been identical, who were reputed to be gluttons who refused to fast at the proper times. Up until the time of Benedict, several attempts had been made by various synods at suppressing and disciplining monks who refused to settle in a cloister. With the establishment of the
Rule of St. Benedict in the eighth century, the
cenobitic and
eremitic forms of monasticism became the accepted form of monasticism within the Church, and the wandering monk phenomenon faded into obscurity.
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