The Cluny site in the Saône-et-Loire department went through different construction phases known as Cluny I, II, and III. It was occupied from the 10th century by a monastery of modest dimensions housing twelve monks around a first abbey (Cluny I) completed in 927. The enlargements – marking the beginnings of Romanesque architecture - of Cluny II were consecrated in 981. At the end of the 11th century (1088), the launching of the vast abbey church of Cluny III, the Major Ecclesia, established the estate as a leading spiritual and cultural center at a European level.