Abbazia di Montecassino cronologia storica

Ultimo aggiornamento il 8 ottobre 2026

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312 a.C. I Volsci, che avevano costruito la prima rocca sulla sommità di Monte Cassino, sono sconfitti nell'area dai Romani, che chiamano Casinum l'insediamento e pongono sulla rocca un tempio ad Apollo. Gli scavi non ne hanno trovato traccia, mentre della città romana restano un anfiteatro, un teatro e un mausoleo.
529 Benedetto da Norcia fonda qui la prima casa dell'ordine benedettino, sul sito pagano. Gregorio Magno racconta che fece a pezzi l'idolo, rovesciò l'altare e abbatté il bosco sacro, poi riutilizzò il tempio come oratorio di san Martino e ne costruì un secondo a san Giovanni Battista dove era stato l'altare. Per questa comunità scrive la Regola, fonda quello che è considerato il primo ospedale d'Europa dell'era nuova, riceve intorno al 543 la visita di Totila re degli Ostrogoti, e qui muore.
580 I Longobardi demoliscono il monastero: la prima di cinque distruzioni. Lo saccheggiano di nuovo nel 581 sotto l'abate Bonito e i monaci superstiti fuggono a Roma per oltre un secolo, mentre il corpo di Benedetto arriva fino a Fleury.
718 L'abate Petronace da Brescia rifonda il monastero su suggerimento di Gregorio II e con il sostegno del duca longobardo Romualdo II di Benevento. Fra i monaci ci sono Carlomanno figlio di Carlo Martello, Rachis e Paolo Diacono.
744 Una donazione di Gisulfo II di Benevento crea la Terra Sancti Benedicti, le terre secolari dell'abbazia, soggette all'abate e a nessun altro se non al papa. Il monastero diventa capitale di un piccolo stato fra la Benevento longobarda e le città bizantine della costa.
884 I Saraceni saccheggiano e bruciano l'abbazia e uccidono l'abate Bertario. La comunità vive a Teano e dal 914 a Capua finché il monastero non è ricostruito nel 949; durante l'esilio vi si introducono le riforme cluniacensi.
1058 Desiderio diventa abate e avvia l'età dell'oro. Ricostruisce con grande magnificenza con artisti da Amalfi, dalla Lombardia e da Costantinopoli, e dopo il 1066 manda ambasciatori a Costantinopoli per ingaggiare mosaicisti bizantini, facendo istruire da loro un gran numero di giovani monaci. La chiesa è consacrata da Alessandro II nel 1071. Già nel 1057 Vittore II aveva riconosciuto all'abate di Montecassino la precedenza su tutti gli altri abati; dall'abbazia escono tre papi.
1349 Un terremoto distrugge gli edifici, e comincia il lungo declino. Nel 1369 Urbano V chiede a ogni monastero benedettino un contributo per la ricostruzione; nel 1454 l'abbazia è data in commenda, e nel 1504 sottoposta a Santa Giustina di Padova.
1799 Le truppe della Francia rivoluzionaria saccheggiano Montecassino.
1866 Il governo italiano sopprime l'abbazia, che diventa monumento nazionale con i monaci custodi dei suoi tesori.
1943 A dicembre vi sono inviati per sicurezza circa 1.400 codici manoscritti insostituibili, documenti dell'abbazia e le raccolte della Keats-Shelley Memorial House di Roma. Gli ufficiali tedeschi tenente colonnello Julius Schlegel e capitano Maximilian Becker, della divisione Hermann Göring, li fanno trasferire in Vaticano all'inizio della battaglia.
1944 Il 15 febbraio l'abbazia è quasi distrutta da bombardamenti aerei a guida americana, ordinati dal generale sir Harold Alexander su rapporti secondo cui i tedeschi la stavano occupando. Truppe tedesche non ce n'erano. Le uniche persone uccise dal bombardamento all'interno furono 230 civili italiani che vi si erano rifugiati, e i paracadutisti tedeschi occuparono poi le rovine perché offrivano un'ottima copertura difensiva.
1964 Paolo VI consacra il 24 ottobre la basilica ricostruita, dopo un intervento sostenuto nei primi anni Cinquanta da Luigi Einaudi, presidente della Repubblica.
2014 Il 23 ottobre papa Francesco sottrae alla giurisdizione dell'abbazia tutte le 53 parrocchie, riducendone l'autorità spirituale alla sola abbazia pur conservandole lo status di abbazia territoriale, e nomina Donato Ogliari 192° successore di san Benedetto. Nel 2015 la comunità conta 13 monaci.

Verificato su Wikipedia, ottobre 2026.

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Verificato su Wikipedia — The history of Monte Cassino is linked to the nearby town of Cassino, first settled in the fifth century BC by the Volsci who built a citadel on the summit; the Volsci in the area were defeated by the Romans in 312 BC, who named the settlement Casinum and built a temple to Apollo at the citadel, and while modern excavations have found no remains of the temple, monumental remains of an amphitheatre, a theatre and a mausoleum show the wealth of the Roman town, The Abbey of Monte Cassino is a Benedictine monastery on a rocky hill about 130 kilometres south-east of Rome in the Latin Valley, located on the site of the ancient Roman town of Casinum, and is the first house of the Benedictine Order, established by Benedict of Nursia himself around 529; it was for the community of Monte Cassino that the Rule of Saint Benedict was composed, According to Gregory the Great's Life of Saint Benedict the monastery was constructed on an older pagan site, a temple of Apollo crowning the hill around which a grove dedicated to demon worship had grown up; Benedict's first act was to smash the sculpture of Apollo and destroy the altar, after which he reused the temple, dedicating it to Saint Martin, and built another chapel dedicated to John the Baptist on the site of the altar, Once established at Monte Cassino Benedict never left: he wrote the Benedictine Rule that became the founding principle for Western monasticism, received a visit from Totila king of the Ostrogoths perhaps in 543, and died there, dying in the oratory of St Martin and being buried in the oratory of St John; the Rule mandated the moral obligation to care for the sick, and at Monte Cassino Benedict founded a hospital considered today to have been the first in Europe of the new era, Monte Cassino was sacked or destroyed a number of times -- "The first to demolish it were Lombards on foot in 580; the last were Allied bombers in 1944" -- the Lombards sacking the abbey in 581 during the abbacy of Bonitus with the surviving monks fleeing to Rome for more than a century and the body of St Benedict being transferred to Fleury, and in 884 Saracens sacking and burning it with Abbot Bertharius killed in the attack, The second monastery was established by Petronax of Brescia around 718 at the suggestion of Pope Gregory II and with the support of the Lombard Duke Romuald II of Benevento, with Carloman son of Charles Martel, Ratchis and Paul the Deacon among the monks; in 744 a donation of Gisulf II of Benevento created the Terra Sancti Benedicti, the secular lands of the abbacy subject to the abbot and nobody else save the pope, making the monastery the capital of a state between the Lombard principality of Benevento and the Byzantine coastal city-states; after the 883 sack the community resided at Teano and from 914 at Capua before the monastery was rebuilt in 949, the Cluniac Reforms being introduced during the exile, Monte Cassino reached the apex of its fame in the 11th century under Abbot Desiderius, abbot 1058-1087, who later became Pope Victor III; the buildings were reconstructed on a scale of great magnificence with artists brought from Amalfi, Lombardy and even Constantinople to supervise the works, and the abbey church was consecrated in 1071 by Pope Alexander II. In 1057 Pope Victor II recognised the abbot of Monte Cassino as having precedence over all other abbots, and three popes were drawn from the abbey, An earthquake damaged the abbey in 1349 and marked the beginning of a long period of decline, with Pope Urban V in 1369 demanding a contribution from all Benedictine monasteries to fund the rebuilding; in 1454 the abbey was placed in commendam and in 1504 made subject to the Abbey of Santa Giustina in Padua; in 1799 Monte Cassino was sacked by French troops during the French Revolutionary Wars, and the abbey was dissolved by the Italian government in 1866, the building becoming a national monument with the monks as custodians of its treasures, In December 1943 some 1,400 irreplaceable manuscript codices, chiefly patristic and historical, in addition to a vast number of documents relating to the history of the abbey and the collections of the Keats-Shelley Memorial House in Rome, had been sent to the abbey archives for safekeeping, and German officers Lt Col Julius Schlegel and Capt Maximilian Becker, both from the Panzer-Division Hermann Göring, had them transferred to the Vatican at the beginning of the battle, During the Battle of Monte Cassino from January to May 1944 the abbey was heavily damaged, and on 15 February 1944 it was nearly destroyed in a series of heavy American-led air raids ordered by General Sir Harold Alexander with the support of numerous Allied commanders, on several reports from British Indian Army officers suggesting that German forces were occupying the monastery, which was considered a key observation post by all those fighting in the field; however during the bombing no German troops were present in the abbey, and subsequent investigations found that the only people killed in the monastery by the bombing were 230 Italian civilians seeking refuge there, after which the ruins were occupied by German Fallschirmjäger paratroopers of the 1st Parachute Division because the ruins provided excellent defensive cover, The abbey was rebuilt after the war, with the President of the Italian Republic Luigi Einaudi giving considerable support to the rebuilding in the early 1950s, and Pope Paul VI consecrated the rebuilt basilica on 24 October 1964; during reconstruction the abbey library was housed at the Pontifical Abbey of St Jerome-in-the-City, On 23 October 2014 Pope Francis applied the norms of the motu proprio Ecclesia Catholica to the abbey, removing from its jurisdiction all 53 parishes and reducing its spiritual jurisdiction to the abbey itself while retaining its status as a territorial abbey, and appointed Father Donato Ogliari as the 192nd successor of Saint Benedict; as of 2015 the monastic community consists of 13 monks (ottobre 2026).

Abbazia di Montecassino cronologia storica

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