Chaves, Pedro de

CHAVES, PEDRO de. - Benedictine abbot. His origin is unknown, whether French or Portuguese. He entered the abbey of Montserrat in 1534, where he was at first received as a layman, but his exceptional abilities later raised him to the rank of choir monk and priest.

As an ascetic writer he is known to us from the mystical work Conversión de la Magdalena (Barcelona 1549), of which an Italian translation was also published a few years after its publication (Naples 1561). He is better known, however, for his activity as a reformer of monasticism in Portugal, where he went in 1558 at the request of the abbot of S. Tirso de Riba d'Ave, together with two other monks of Montserrat, Placido de Villabodos and Giovanni Chanon. With their help he was able to introduce the reform of the Spanish Congregation of St. Benedict of Valladolid in various 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.