Rodrigo Álvarez de Sarria

Rodrigo Álvarez

count of Sarria

Sarria

1178-1180

By the early 1170s a member of the Order of Santiago, in 1172-1173 he sought permission to found a new order with the Cistercian rule. The new order's first properties were granted in Aragón in 1174. In 1176 or 1177 grants were made to the order by Raynald of Chatillon. By 1180, the order had acquired its name "Mountjoy" referring to Nabi Samwil, the hill from which pilgrims and crusaders from Europe first saw Jerusalem. Forey (1971) concurs with earlier historians that Rodrigo was undoubtedly in the Latin East in the late 1170s.

Alan Forey, "The Order of Mountjoy," Speculum 46:2 (1971): 250-266.