CHAVES, PEDRO de. - Benedictine abbot. His origin is unknown, whether French or Portuguese. In 1534 he entered the abbey of Monserrato, where he was at first received as a layman, but his exceptional abilities subsequently raised him to the rank of choir monk and priest.
As an ascetical writer he is known to us through the mystical work Conversión de la Magdalena (Barcelona 1549), of which an Italian translation was also published a few years after its appearance (Naples 1561). He is better known, however, for his activity as a reformer of monasticism in Portugal, whither he went in 1558 at the request of the abbot of S. Tirso de Riba d'Ave, together with two other monks of Monserrato, Placido de Villabodos and Giovanni Chanon. With their assistance he was able to introduce the reform of the Spanish Congregation of S. Benedict of Valladolid into several monasteries and thus to found the Portuguese Benedictine Congregation, of which he himself was the first abbot general. The new Congregation was approved by Pope Pius V in 1566.