A monk of Saint-Denis near Paris and author of De profectione Ludovici Septimi in Orientem, a narrative of the French expedition during the Second Crusade (1147-1149). Odo (Fr. Eudes) accompanied King Louis VII on this crusade as royal chaplain and provisioner of the army. His short but important work was addressed to his abbot, Suger.
The dominant features of Odo’s narrative are its near- hagiographical approach to Louis VII (whose crusade was a complete failure) and its extreme anti-Greek bias. Both features explain why he only covered the campaign and its preparations from 1145 up to spring 1148, omitting the king’s disastrous sojourns in Antioch and in the kingdom of Jerusalem. Acutely aware, as was Suger, that the crusade left unfinished business, he recorded details and advice useful to subsequent crusaders.
Virtually unknown to his contemporaries, the work survives in a single copy (MS Bruxelles, Bibliothèque royale Albert Ier, 4190-4200). Perhaps inspired by Pope Eugenius III’s interest during a visit by Louis and Odo to Rome in October 1149, he probably wrote the account to influence attempts by Suger, in 1150, to organize a new crusade. Appointed abbot of Compiègne in 1150, Odo succeeded Suger at Saint-Denis in 1151, but the community was fac- tionalized and his abbacy marked by discord.