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For information about the World War II battle, see the Battle of Monte Cassino. World War II, or the Second World War, (often abbreviated WWII) was a global military conflict which involved a majority of the world's nations, including Monte Cassino has made it the repeated scene of battles and Sieges from antiquity.
The restored Abbey of Monte Cassino.
The restored Abbey of Monte Cassino.

Monte Cassino is a rocky hill about 130 km (80 miles) south of Rome, Italy, c. Rome ( Roma ˈroma Roma is the capital city of Italy and Lazio, and is Italy's largest and most populous city with more than 2 Italy (Italia officially the Italian Republic, (Repubblica Italiana is located on the Italian Peninsula in Southern Europe, and on the two largest 2 km to the west of the town of Cassino (the Roman Casinum having been on the hill) and 520 m altitude. Casinum, an ancient town of Italy, probably of Volscian origin It is noted as the site where Benedict of Nursia established his first monastery, the source of the Benedictine Order, around 529, and of major battles towards the end of World War II. "Saint Benedict" redirects here This article is about the founder of Western monasticism for other saints named Benedict see Benedict. This article concerns the buildings occupied by monastics. For the life inside monasteries and its historical roots see Monasticism. Benedictine refers to the Spirituality and Consecrated life in accordance with the Rule of St Benedict, written by Benedict of Nursia in World War II, or the Second World War, (often abbreviated WWII) was a global military conflict which involved a majority of the world's nations, including

Contents

History

The monastery was constructed on an older pagan site, a temple of Apollo that crowned the hill, enclosed by a fortifying wall above the small town of Cassino, still largely pagan at the time and recently devastated by the Goths. A temple (from the Latin word Templum) is a structure reserved for religious or spiritual activities such as prayer and sacrifice or analogous rites Paganism (from Latin paganus, meaning "country dweller rustic" is a word used to refer to various religions and religious beliefs from across the world The Goths ( Gothic: Gothic usvg|14px|u]]Gothic asvg|14px|a]]Gothic s Benedict's first act was to smash the sculpture of Apollo and destroy the altar. He rededicated the site to John the Baptist. Saint John the Baptist ( heb. Jochanan ben Sacharja, arab. يحيى Yaḥyā or يوحنا Yūḥanna, aram. Once established there, Benedict never left. At Monte Cassino he wrote the Benedictine Rule that became the founding principle for western monasticism. Monasticism (from Greek μοναχός, monachos, derived from Greek monos, alone is the religious practice in which one There at Monte Cassino he received a visit from Totila, king of the Ostrogoths, perhaps in 543 (the only remotely secure historical date for Benedict), and there he died. Totila (died Jul 1 552) was king of the Ostrogoths from 541 until his death

View across the valley.
View across the valley.

Monte Cassino became a model for future developments. Unfortunately its protected site has always made it an object of strategic importance. It was sacked or destroyed a number of times. In 584 the Lombards sacked the Abbey, and the surviving monks fled to Rome, where they remained for more than a century. The Lombards ( Latin Langobardi, whence the alternative names Langobards and Longobards) were a Germanic people originally from During this time the body of St Benedict was transferred to Fleury, the modern Saint-Benoit-sur-Loire near Orleans, France. Saint-Benoît-sur-Loire is a commune of the Loiret département, in France. A flourishing period of Monte Cassino followed its re-establishment in 718 by Abbot Petronax, when among the monks were Carloman, son of Charles Martel; Ratchis, predecessor of the great Lombard Duke and King Aistulf; and Paul the Deacon, the historian of the Lombards. Saint Petronax of Monte Cassino ( Petronace di Monte Cassino; c Carloman (between 706 and 716 &ndash 17 August 754 was the eldest son of Charles Martel, Major domo or Mayor of the palace and duke Ratchis was the Duke of Friuli ( 739 - 744) and king of the Lombards ( 744 - 749) Aistulf (749 - d756 was the Duke of Friuli from 744 king of Lombards from 749 and duke of Spoleto from 751 Paul the Deacon (c 720 &ndash 13 April probably 799 also known as Paulus Diaconus, Warnefred and Cassinensis (i In 744, a donation of Gisulf II of Benevento created the Terra Sancti Benedicti, the secular lands of the abbacy, which were subject to the abbot and nobody else save the pope. Gisulf II (died between 749 and 753 was the third last Duke of Benevento before the fall of the Lombard kingdom. The Terra Sancti Benedicti ("Land of Saint Benedict" was the secular territory or Seignory, of the powerful Abbey of Montecassino, the chief Thus, the monastery became the capital of a state comprising a compact and strategic region between the Lombard principality of Benevento and the Byzantine city-states of the coast (Naples, Gaeta, and Amalfi). The Duchy and later Principality of Benevento was the southernmost Lombard duchy in medieval Italy centred on Benevento, a city central in the Mezzogiorno The Duchy of Naples ( Ducatus Neapolitanus) began as a Byzantine province that was constituted in the seventh century in the reduced coastal lands that the Lombards The Duchy of Gaeta was an early Middle Ages state centred on the coastal South Italian city of Gaeta. Republic or Duchy of Amalfi was a de facto independent state centred on the south Italian city of the same name during the tenth and eleventh In 883 Saracens sacked and then burned it down. Saracen was a term used by Europeans in the Middle Ages for Fatimids at first then later for all who professed the religion of Islam. Among the great historians who worked at the monastery, in this period there is Erchempert, whose Historia Langobardorum Beneventanorum is a fundamental chronicle of the ninth-century Mezzogiorno. Erchempert (also Herempert Erchempertus Erchemperto was a monk of Monte Cassino in the final quarter of the Ninth century. Geography Southern Italy forms the lower "boot" of the Italian peninsula containing the ankle (Abruzzo and Molise and southern Lazio the toe (Calabria and the heel

The façade of the church.
The façade of the church.

It was rebuilt and reached the apex of its fame in the 11th century under the abbot Desiderius (abbot 1058 - 1087), who later became Pope Victor III. Pope Victor III ( c.1026 &ndash 16 September 1087) born Daufer (Dauphar Latinised Dauferius, was the Pope (from The number of monks rose to over two hundred, and the library, the manuscripts produced in the scriptorium and the school of manuscript illuminators became famous throughout the West. Scriptorium, literally "a place for writing" is commonly used to refer to a room in medieval European Monasteries devoted to the copying of manuscripts by monastic The unique Beneventan script flourished there during Desiderius' abbacy. Beneventan script was a medieval script, so called because it originated in the Duchy of Benevento in Southern Italy. The buildings of the monastery were reconstructed on a scale of great magnificence, artists being brought from Amalfi, Lombardy, and even Constantinople to supervise the various works. The abbey church, rebuilt and decorated with the utmost splendor, was consecrated in 1071 by Pope Alexander II. Alexander II (died April 21, 1073) born Anselmo da Baggio, was Pope from 1061 to 1073 A detailed account of the abbey at this date exists in the Chronica monasterii Cassinensis by Leo of Ostia and Amatus of Monte Cassino gives us our best source on the early Normans in the south. Leo Marsicanus (meaning "of the Marsi " or Ostiensis (meaning "of Ostia " also known as Leone dei Conti di Marsi (1046 Amatus of Montecassino ( Amatus Casinensis) a Benedictine monk at the Abbey of Montecassino is one of three Italo-Norman Chroniclers The Normans were the people who gave their names to Normandy, a region in northern France.

Abbot Desiderius sent envoys to Constantinople some time after 1066 to hire expert Byzantine mosaicists for the decoration of the rebuilt abbey church. Pope Victor III ( c.1026 &ndash 16 September 1087) born Daufer (Dauphar Latinised Dauferius, was the Pope (from Constantinople (Κωνσταντινούπολις Konstantinoúpolis, or gr ἡ Πόλις hē Polis, Latin: la CONSTANTINOPOLIS According to chronicler Leo of Ostia the Greek artists decorated the apse, the arch and the vestibule of the basilica. Leo Marsicanus (meaning "of the Marsi " or Ostiensis (meaning "of Ostia " also known as Leone dei Conti di Marsi (1046 Their work was admired by contemporaries but was totally destroyed in later centuries except two fragments depicting greyhounds (now in the Monte Cassino Museum). "The abbot in his wisdom decided that great number of young monks in the monastery should be thoroughly initiated in these arts" - says the chronicler about the role of the Greeks in the revival of mosaic art in medieval Italy.

The Polish flag flying over the rubble of Monte Cassino, 1944.
The Polish flag flying over the rubble of Monte Cassino, 1944.

An earthquake damaged the Abbey in 1349, and although the site was rebuilt it marked the beginning of a long period of decline. In 1321, Pope John XXII made the church of Monte Cassino a cathedral, and the carefully preserved independence of the monastery from episcopal interference was at an end. Pope John (numbering Pope John XXII (1249 &ndash December 4, 1334) born Jacques Duèze (or d'Euse) was Pope from 1316 to 1334 In 1505 the monastery was joined with that of St. Justina of Padua. The site was sacked by Napoleon's troops in 1799 and from the dissolution of the Italian monasteries in 1866, Monte Cassino became a national monument. There was a final destruction on February 15, 1944 when during the Battle of Monte Cassino (January - May 1944), the entire building was pulverized in a series of heavy air-raids. Events 590 - Khosrau II is crowned as king of Persia 1637 - Ferdinand III becomes Holy Roman Emperor Year 1944 ( MCMXLIV) was a Leap year starting on Saturday (link will display full calendar of the Gregorian calendar. Monte Cassino has made it the repeated scene of battles and Sieges from antiquity. The Abbey was rebuilt after the war, financed by the Italian State. Pope Paul VI reconsecrated it in 1964. Pope

The archives, besides a vast number of documents relating to the history of the abbey, contained some 1400 irreplaceable manuscript codices, chiefly patristic and historical. A codex ( Latin for block of wood, Book; plural codices) is a book in the format used for modern books with separate pages normally They also contained the collections of the Keats-Shelley House in Rome which had been sent to the Abbey for safety in December 1942. By great foresight on the part of Lt. Col. Julius Schlegel (a Catholic), a Vienna-born German officer, and Captain Maximilian Becker (a Protestant), both from the Panzer-Division Hermann Göring, these were all transferred to the Vatican at the beginning of the battle. The Fallschirm-Panzer-Division1 Hermann Göring ( 1st Paratroop Panzer Division Hermann Goering - abbreviated Fallschirm-Panzer-Div 1 HG

References

See also

External links

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