The village's history is closely linked to the Saint Stephen abbey "Abbaye Saint-Étienne-de-Fontenay" founded on his land of Fontenay by Raoul Tesson around 1047 under the patronage of Duke William of Normandy (before he became King of England following his victory in Hastings in 1066) and which survived until the French Revolution at the end of the 18th century. Most of the abbey was destroyed at the beginning of the 19th century, but there still remains a 13th-century building along the Orne river, and the abbot's more "modern" house (not visited) rebuilt at the beginning of the 18th century.