Monte Cassino Abbey, the first monastery of the Benedictine order, located to the south of Rome, at the top of Mount Cassino, a rocky hill just west of the town of Cassino. The abbey was founded by Benedict of Nursia in 529 on a site that, according to a biography by St. Gregory the Great, was previously dedicated to the god Apollo.
Benedict remained at Monte Cassino until his death in about 547. The monastery was sacked by Lombards in 580 and reestablished in 718 by Abbot Petronax. It was again sacked, by Saracens (Muslims) in 884, and again it was later rebuilt. The abbey’s population and reputation for a high state of discipline reached their peak under Abbot Desiderius (later Pope Victor III), who became abbot around 1057. He commissioned the reconstruction of the monastery’s buildings by artists brought in from Amalfi, Lombardy, and Constantinople. It housed a rich library, and it also acquired a large secular area. The site was reconsecrated in 1071 by Pope Alexander II. However, in the 13th century the monastery witnessed a steady decline. The abbey’s consecutive courtyards with arcades in the Doric order date from 1515, and a cloister is attributed to Donato Bramante. Designed by Cosimo Fansaga, the fourth church to occupy the site was begun in 1649 and consecrated in 1727 by Benedict XIII. A crypt in the eastern portion of the church contains the tomb of St. Benedict, whereas the left transept houses the monument of Pietro de Medici, whose tomb is the work of the architect Antonio da Sangallo.
When the monasteries of Italy were dissolved in 1866, the abbey became a national monument. During World War II, it was destroyed during the four battles of Monte Cassino, when, in 1944, the Allies, mistakenly believing it to be occupied by the German military, bombed the abbey. Reconstruction took more than a decade and was financed by the Italian government, and it was rededicated by Pope Paul VI in 1964. A small number of monks continue to reside in the abbey, and a museum and the abbey itself are open to tourists and pilgrims.