Grottaferrata () is a small town and ''
comune'' in the
Metropolitan City of Rome
Metropolitan City of Rome Capital ( it, Città metropolitana di Roma Capitale) is an area of local government at the level of metropolitan city in the Lazio region of the Republic of Italy. It comprises the territory of the city of Rome and 120 o ...
, situated on the lower slopes of the
Alban Hills
The Alban Hills ( it, Colli Albani) are the caldera remains of a quiescent volcano, volcanic complex in Italy, located southeast of Rome and about north of Anzio. The high Monte Cavo forms a highly visible peak the centre of the caldera, bu ...
, south east of
Rome. It has grown up around the
Abbey of Santa Maria di Grottaferrata, founded in 1004. Nearby communes include
Frascati,
Rocca di Papa,
Marino and Rome.
History
The history of Grottaferrata identifies largely with that of the
Basilian Monastery of Santa Maria, founded here in 1004 by
Saint Nilus the Younger. The
founding legend
An origin myth is a myth that describes the origin of some feature of the nature , natural or social world. One type of origin myth is the creation myth, creation or Cosmogony, cosmogonic myth, a story that describes the creation of the world. ...
narrates that, at the spot where the abbey now stands, the
Virgin Mary appeared and bade him found a church in her honour.
From Gregory, the powerful
Count of Tusculum
The counts of Tusculum, also known as the Theophylacti, were a family of secular noblemen from Latium that maintained a powerful position in Rome between the 10th and 12th centuries. Several popes and an antipope during the 11th century came from ...
, father of Popes
Benedict VIII
Pope Benedict VIII ( la, Benedictus VIII; c. 980 – 9 April 1024) was bishop of Rome and ruler of the Papal States from 18 May 1012 until his death. He was born Theophylact to the noble family of the counts of Tusculum. Unusually for a medieva ...
and
John XIX
Pope John XIX ( la, Ioannes XIX; died October 1032), born Romanus, was the bishop of Rome and ruler of the Papal States from 1024 to his death. He belonged to the family of the powerful counts of Tusculum, succeeding his brother, Benedict VIII. ...
, Nilus obtained the site, which had been a
Roman villa, where among the ruins there remained a low edifice of ''
opus quadratum'' that had been a tomb but had been converted to a Christian
oratory in the fourth century. Its iron window grates gave the site the name, first of ''Cryptaferrata'' ("ironbound crypt") then of ''Grottaferrata'', commemorated in the coat-of-arms of the commune. From the site, a Roman bronze of a man and a cow attracted the antiquarian attention of
Frederick II, Holy Roman Emperor
Frederick II (German language, German: ''Friedrich''; Italian language, Italian: ''Federico''; Latin: ''Federicus''; 26 December 1194 – 13 December 1250) was King of Sicily from 1198, King of Germany from 1212, King of Italy and Holy Roman Em ...
, who had the group removed to Lucera.
Nilus died soon afterwards (26 December 1005) in the Sant' Agata monastery in
Tusculum. The monastic building was carried out by his successors, especially the fourth abbot,
Saint Bartholomew, who is usually considered the second founder. Building materials scavenged from the ruined villa were incorporated into the new structure, marble columns, sections of carved cornice, and blocks of the volcanic stone called ''peperino''. The sanctuary was complete enough in 1024 to be consecrated by the Tusculan Pope John XIX.
The high repute of the monks attracted many gifts; eleventh- and thirteenth-century mosaics remain, but of the ambitious ensemble of
Cosmatesque inlay, only the polychrome stone paving remains. The abbey's possessions in lands were numerous and widespread, and in 1131 King
Roger II of Sicily
Roger II ( it, Ruggero II; 22 December 1095 – 26 February 1154) was King of Sicily and Africa, son of Roger I of Sicily
Roger I ( it, Ruggero I, Arabic: ''رُجار'', ''Rujār''; Maltese: ''Ruġġieru'', – 22 June 1101), nicknamed Rog ...
made the abbot Baron of
Rossano
Rossano is a town and ''frazione'' of Corigliano-Rossano in the province of Cosenza, Calabria, southern Italy. The city is situated on an eminence from the Gulf of Taranto. The town is known for its marble and alabaster quarries.
The town is t ...
with an extensive fief. Between the 12th and 15th centuries the monastery suffered from the continual strife of warring factions: Romans and Tusculans,
Guelphs and Ghibellines
The Guelphs and Ghibellines (, , ; it, guelfi e ghibellini ) were factions supporting the Pope and the Holy Roman Emperor, respectively, in the Italian city-states of Central Italy and Northern Italy.
During the 12th and 13th centuries, ri ...
, popes and antipopes,
Colonna and
Orsini. From 1163 till the
destruction of Tusculum in 1191, the greater part of the monastic community sought refuge in a dependency of the abbey, the Benedictine ''protocaenobium'' of
Subiaco.
In the middle of the 13th century the Emperor
Frederick II made the abbey his headquarters during the siege of Rome, while in 1378 Breton and Gascon mercenaries held it for the antipope
Clement VII. The fifteenth century saw the bloody feuds of the Colonna and the Orsini raging round the walls. According to the humanist
Ambrogio Traversari
Ambrogio Traversari, also referred to as Ambrose of Camaldoli (138620 October 1439), was an Italian monk and theologian who was a prime supporter of the papal cause in the 15th century. He is honored as a saint by the Camaldolese Order.
Biography ...
, in 1432 the appearance of the abbey was that of a barracks rather than a monastery.
In 1462 began a line of non-resident abbots ''
in commendam
In canon law, commendam (or ''in commendam'') was a form of transferring an ecclesiastical benefice ''in trust'' to the ''custody'' of a patron. The phrase ''in commendam'' was originally applied to the provisional occupation of an ecclesiastical ...
'', fifteen in number, of whom all but one were
cardinals. The most distinguished were the Greek
Bessarion, Giulio della Rovere (afterwards
Julius II), and the last of the line,
Cardinal Consalvi, secretary of state to
Pius VII. Cardinal Bessarion, himself a
Basilian monk, increased the scanty and impoverished community and restored the church. Cardinal Giulio della Rovere, for more selfish motives, erected the castle and surrounded the whole monastery with the imposing fortifications that still exist.
Cardinal Alessandro Farnese
Alessandro Farnese (5 October 1520 – 2 March 1589), an Italian cardinal and diplomat and a great collector and patron of the arts, was the grandson of Pope Paul III (who also bore the name ''Alessandro Farnese''), and the son of Pier Luigi Farn ...
replaced the ceiling.
Gian Lorenzo Bernini
Gian Lorenzo (or Gianlorenzo) Bernini (, , ; Italian Giovanni Lorenzo; 7 December 159828 November 1680) was an Italian sculptor and architect. While a major figure in the world of architecture, he was more prominently the leading sculptor of his ...
was commissioned by
Cardinal Francesco Barberini to provide the high altar, completed in 1665.
Till 1608 the community was ruled by priors dependent on abbots ''in commendam'', but in that year Grottaferrata became a member of the Basilian congregation founded by
Gregory XIII. The revenues of the community were separated from those of the commendatory abbots, and the first of a series of triennially appointed regular abbots was appointed. The triennial system survived the suppression of the ''commendam'' and lasted till the end of the nineteenth century, with one break from 1834 to 1870, when priors were appointed by the
Holy See. In 1901, new constitutions came into force and Arsenio Pellegrini was installed as the first perpetual regular abbot since 1462.
The
Greek Rite
The Byzantine Rite, also known as the Greek Rite or the Rite of Constantinople, identifies the wide range of cultural, liturgical, and canonical practices that developed in the Eastern Christian Church of Constantinople.
The canonical hours are ...
which was brought to Grottaferrata by St. Nilus had lost its native character by the end of the twelfth century, but was restored by order of
Leo XIII in 1881. The Basilian abbey has always been a home of Greek learning, and Greek hymnography flourished there long after the art had died out within the Byzantine Empire. Monastic studies were revived under Cardinal Bessarion and again in 1608.
On 11 August 1901 the first electricity reached Grottaferrata from the hydroelectric plant in S. Bartholomew fall.
On 26 September 1937, the monastery was made a
territorial abbacy of the
Italo-Albanian Catholic Church
The Italo-Albanian Catholic Church ( la, Ecclesia Catholica Italo-Albanica; it, Chiesa Cattolica Italo-Albanese; sq, Kisha Katolike-Bizantine Arbëreshë), Italo-Albanian Byzantine-Catholic Church or Italo-Albanian Church, is one of the 23 E ...
under the title
Territorial Abbacy of Saint Mary of Grottaferrata
The Territorial Abbacy of Santa Maria of Grottaferrata is an ecclesiastical jurisdiction which administers the Abbey of Saint Mary in Grottaferrata located in Grottaferrata, Rome, Lazio, Italy. The Abbacy and its territory are stauropegic, that is, ...
.
Main sights
The has several courts, which lead to the famous
portico
A portico is a porch leading to the entrance of a building, or extended as a colonnade, with a roof structure over a walkway, supported by columns or enclosed by walls. This idea was widely used in ancient Greece and has influenced many cult ...
designed by
Antonio da Sangallo the Younger, with an arcade of nine bays supported by slender columns with Renaissance capitals.
Of the abbey church consecrated by John XIX in 1024, little can be seen in the interior except the mosaics in the
narthex and over the triumphal arch, the medieval structures having been covered or destroyed during the "restorations" of various
abbots ''in commendam''. Some fragmentary thirteenth-century frescoes were revealed in a partial restoration of the church in 1904 to commemorate its novecentennial, when it was made a Roman
basilica. The mosaics portray the ''Twelve Apostles'' sitting beside an empty throne, evoking Christ's ascent to Heaven.
Domenichino's frescoes, commissioned by
Cardinal Odoardo Farnese
Odoardo Farnese (6 December 1573 – 21 February 1626) was an Italian nobleman, the second son of Alessandro Farnese, Duke of Parma and Maria of Portugal, known for his patronage of the arts. He became a Cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church in 1 ...
in 1608, can be seen in the chapel of St. Nilus.
Annibale Carracci
Annibale Carracci (; November 3, 1560 – July 15, 1609) was an Italian painter and instructor, active in Bologna and later in Rome. Along with his brother and cousin, Annibale was one of the progenitors, if not founders of a leading strand of th ...
executed the altarpiece of the ''Madonna with Child with St. Nilus and St. Bartholomew''.
The modern portico protects the ancient façade; the marble portal with a mosaic above it, an example of Italo-Byzantine art of the twelfth century. In the interior is a baptismal font supported on winged lions, of the tenth or eleventh centuries. Noteworthy also is the Romanesque
campanile
A bell tower is a tower that contains one or more bells, or that is designed to hold bells even if it has none. Such a tower commonly serves as part of a Christian church, and will contain church bells, but there are also many secular bell tower ...
(twelfth century), with five storeys of tripartite arched windows.
The library of the Abbey, which contains some 50,000 volumes, has a paper conservation ''Laboratorio di Restauro'', which was entrusted with the conservation of
Leonardo
Leonardo is a masculine given name, the Italian, Spanish, and Portuguese equivalent of the English, German, and Dutch name, Leonard
Leonard or ''Leo'' is a common English masculine given name and a surname.
The given name and surname originate ...
's
Codex Atlanticus from the
Biblioteca Ambrosiana; the library houses writings of St. Nilus and his pupils and a rare copy of
Alvise Cadamosto's collected travel accounts, printed in the early sixteenth century.
Pope Benedict IX died and was buried in this abbey.
International relations
Grottaferrata is
twinned with:
*
Vandœuvre-lès-Nancy
Vandœuvre-lès-Nancy (, literally ''Vandœuvre near Nancy'') is a commune in the Meurthe-et-Moselle department in north-eastern France. Its inhabitants are called ''Vandopériens''.
Geography
With 29,942 inhabitants (2019), Vandœuvre is the ...
,
France
*
Patmos,
Greece
* Bethlehem, Palestine
*
Bisignano,
Italy
*
Bracigliano, Italy
*
Oria, Italy
*
Rofrano, Italy
*
Rossano
Rossano is a town and ''frazione'' of Corigliano-Rossano in the province of Cosenza, Calabria, southern Italy. The city is situated on an eminence from the Gulf of Taranto. The town is known for its marble and alabaster quarries.
The town is t ...
, Italy
*
Sant'Elia Fiumerapido, Italy
*
San Mauro la Bruca, Italy
Climate
The
Köppen Climate Classification subtype for this climate is "
Csa
CSA may refer to:
Arts and media
* Canadian Screen Awards, annual awards given by the Academy of Canadian Cinema & Television
* Commission on Superhuman Activities, a fictional American government agency in Marvel Comics
* Crime Syndicate of Amer ...
" (Mediterranean Climate).
Climate Summary for Grottaferrata
/ref>
References
Sources
External links
Exarchic Abbey of St. Mary in Grottaferrata
{{Authority control
1004 establishments in Europe
11th-century establishments in Italy
Populated places established in the 11th century
Cities and towns in Lazio
Monasteries in Lazio
Italo-Albanian Catholic Church
Castelli Romani
11th-century establishments in the Papal States