![[abbey of Monte Cassino]](ncd05562.jpg "21kb jpg photograph of the restored abbey of Monte Cassino; swiped off the Wikipedia web site; please do not write to ask about the image")
Near Rome, it is the cradle of the Benedictine Order which was founded in 529 at Monte Cassino by Saint Benedict of Nursia, who wrote his famous Rule there.
The abbey was burned by Lombards in 580, and restored by Abbot Petronax in 718.
It was sacked again in 884, and restored again in 949.
It reached the zenith of its reputation under Abbot Desiderius, 1058 to 1087, when the school of copyists and miniature painters became famous throughout the West.
In 1321 Pope John XXII made the church of Monte Cassino a cathedral and its abbot, a bishop.
The change proved disastrous, for the bishop was often a secular prelate who adopted the income for his personal use.
Pope Urban V temporarily restored the community, 1370.
In 1504 Pope Julius II united Monte Cassino to the Congregation of Saint Justina of Padua which was thenceforth known as the Cassinese Congregation.
It was confiscated by the Italian government with the other religious houses, 1866, but the abbot was given the title Guardian, in view of his administration of the diocese, one of the most extensive in Italy, which was united to the See of Atina, 1818.
In 1944 it was bombed into ruins during the World War II Battle of Monte Cassino.
It was rebuilt by the Italian government, consecrated by Pope Paul VI in 1964, and can be reached by visitors.
See also,
New Catholic Dictionary
