Bernay Abbey, Benedictine abbey church in Bernay, France

Bernay Abbey is a Romanesque monastery church featuring massive stone walls, rounded arches, and substantial pillars that support the elevated nave. The building displays the solid, powerful architecture typical of Norman construction with its thick walls and robust structural elements.

Judith of Brittany founded the Benedictine monastery around 1015 on dowry lands centred on Bernay, but she died in 1017 with construction unfinished. In 1025 Richard II granted it a vast estate, placed it under Fécamp Abbey and entrusted the works to the Italian abbot Guillaume de Volpiano. Around 1055 Vitalis of Creuilly obtained autonomy and full abbey status.

The abbey was placed under the authority of Fécamp Abbey in 1025, and its first guardians came from that mother house. The church is dedicated to the Virgin Mary, and the abbey's arms show a seated Notre-Dame holding the Christ Child. The nave capitals were covered with stucco during 17th-century Maurist works.

The abbey church stands in the centre of Bernay, in the Eure department. Its Romanesque nave, with massive piers and a high vault, is open to visitors; the 12th-century arch and the capitals of the south transept, uncovered in 1965, are inside. The building is a classified historic monument, and the town and Monuments historiques restored it from 1963 and again in 1978.

The abbey church was listed as a historic monument in 1862, the other abbey buildings in 1965 and the archaeological remains on the site in 1999. The 1978 restoration revealed the building's importance to the study of 11th-century architecture.