Farfa

A rich Benedictine monastery of the early Middle Ages, located northeast of Rome, Italy. Founded c 680-700, its scriptorium was famous and it has undergone several rebuildings and ambitious additions.

One of the richest Benedictine monasteries in Italy in the early Middle Ages, situated northeast of Rome. The scriptorium was famous and the Farfa Chronicle was widely imitated. Founded c680-700, Farfa came under the protection of the Lombard duke of Spoleto in 705 and, with the Carolingian conquest of 774, passed into the hands of Charlemagne. An ambitious programme of building took place under Abbot Siccard (830-42). The monastery was burnt during the Moslem incursion of 897, but restored by later abbots, notably Ratfred (in 933) and Hugo (998-1039). Very little of the medieval complex survives above ground, but a series of excavations has revealed remains of the principal church (perhaps of the 8th century, with transepts and a crypt added by Siccard); one of the five minor churches mentioned in medieval descriptions at Farfa; the cemetery and other structures including a concentric ambulatory outside the crypt. This last feature recalls the early 9th-century arrangement at Fulda in Germany, and suggests that the abbots of Farfa were as aware of the latest architectural developments north of the Alps as of those in Rome.