Odon de Cluny (vers 879-942) fut chanoine de Saint-Martin-de-Tours au début de sa carrière religieuse. Il garda toute sa vie un profond attachement à la figure de saint Martin, comme pionnier et héros du monachisme. La basilique de Saint-Martin à Tours fut ravagée à plusieurs reprises par des incendies; celui de 903 eut pour témoin le jeune Odon qui s’en souvenait encore, à la fin de sa vie, vers 940-942, lorsqu’il rédigea un sermon sur l’incendie dans lequel se manifestent certains thèmes de la réforme monastique en relation avec la figure martinienne. On rappellera aussi qu’au xe et xie siècles le patronage martinien fut associée à des fondations (ou des refondations) appelées à un grand avenir : Cologne, Albelda, Laon, Tournai, Pontoise, et particulièrement à Paris, la grande abbaye de Saint-Martin des Champs qui, à la fin du xie siècle, devint une des « filles » de Cluny.Odo of Cluny (c. 879-942) was a canon of Saint-Martin of Tours at the beginning of his religious career. During all his life he kept a deep attachment to the figure of St Martin, as a forerunner and a hero of monasticism. The great St-Martin’s basilica at Tours was destroyed by fire several times; the young Odo was a witness of the 903 disaster. And, at the end of his life, c. 940-942, Odo had still the memory of this event while he wrote up a sermon about this fire and he took this opportunity to question some monastic reform issues linked with the Martinian figure. It has to be recalled also that in the tenth and eleventh centuries the Martinian patronage was given to foundations (or re-foundations) designed to a brilliant future: Cologne, Albelda, Laon, Tournai, Pontoise, and especially the great abbey of Saint-Martin des Champs at Paris, which became one of the daughter houses of Cluny at the end of the eleventh century
