MONTE CASINO (or Cassino). The Benedictine monastery known as the abbey of Monte Cassino is a huge square building of three stories, built on the usual Benedictine plan (see Abbey) on the summit of a picturesque isolated hill, about 3 J miles to the north-east of the town of Cassino (Casinum) or San Germano (population about 5000), which lies midway between Rome and Naples in the valley of the Garigliano. The most prominent architectural feature is the large church (1727), richly decorated in the interior with marbles, mosaics, and paintings. The library and archivio have been spoken of elsewhere (vol. xiv. pp. 531, 548).

The date of Benedict’s withdrawal from Subiaco to Cassino is 529. At that time Cassino was the site of a temple of Apollo and of a grove sacred to Venus. The result of the saint’s preaching was that the natives demolished both, chapels to St Martin and John the Baptist being built in their stead, while farther up the hill a monastery began to rise. About 589 the monks were driven from it to Rome by the Lombards of Benevento, and it lay waste for more than a century, until resuscitated by Gregory II. (719). In 787 it received fresh privileges from Charlemagne; in 884 it was burnt by the Saracens, and was not restored until about seventy years later. From 1322 to 1366 the abbot held episcopal rank; under the house of Anjou he bore the title of Abbas abbatum, and ranked as first baron of the realm. In 1504 the abbey was sacked by the troops of Gonzalo de Cordova. In 1866 it shared the fate of all other religious houses in Italy; it is now inhabited by a few monks, and used as a seminary, having about 200 pupils.