In this article, the author examines a corpus of vernacular translations by the Cistercian order. The manuscripts, some of them luxuriously made, appear to have been intended for the edification of a cultivated lay audience. He attempts to identify a close-knit group of a dozen translations of pious texts from the late twelfth and early thirteenth centuries to gain some insight into the history of religious movements and religious training in the period when lay pious organizations rapidly spread through northeastern France and Belgium.