According to Caesarius of Heisterbach's story in his Dialogus Miraculorum, a man and his mistress assumed lives of penitence at the church of S. Maximin. Several Schrien-entries name the man as Waldaver. Stein suggests that Waldaver and his mistress attracted a circle of women which developed into a regular nunnery. This must have occurred before 1186, because by this date S. Maximin is treated as a regular nunnery recieving gifts of land. Stein concludes that S. Maximin originated as a result of the initiative of the women who had gathered around Waldaver.
Waldover and his mistress
A charter issued by S. Ursula to S. Maximin in 1188 freed the latter from some sort of dependent relationship with the former.
The convent appears to have been a mix of patrician and middle-class women. Of the identified nuns, two were patrician and two were middle-class.
In 1186 the nunnery records gifts of lands from Archbishop Phillip of Heinsberg.
[1]Stadtarchiv St. Maximin Urkundenbuch;
Stadtarchiv Gelenii Farragines, vol 24, f. 23v
more research necessary
