Description
The Benedictine Monastery, officially San Nicolò l'Arena, is a gigantic Baroque complex on Piazza Dante, in Catania's historic center: about 210 by 130 meters, it is considered the second-largest Benedictine monastery in Europe, a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 2002 and today home to the University's humanities departments.
The south and east facades are a showcase of late Sicilian Baroque: scrolls, flowers, fruit, putti, nymphs and monstrous masks around every window and balcony, the work of stonecutters who came from all over the island to rebuild the city. In 1773 the Scottish traveler Patrick Brydone called it the "Sicilian Versailles."
Inside are two large cloisters. The Marble Cloister, the oldest, has white marble columns and a 17th-century fountain; the eastern one is a garden with the Caffeaos at its center, a Neo-Gothic pavilion covered in colorful majolica tiles. Between the two runs the clock corridor, 214 meters long.
Also worth seeing are Vaccarini's great refectory, with a vault so high it looks like a church, and, in the basement, the mosaics of a Roman domus, discovered during the restoration and viewed from a suspended walkway.
Next door stands the Church of San Nicolò l'Arena, larger than the Cathedral, with its facade left unfinished, the great organ by Donato Del Piano and a meridian line 40 meters long.
The monks came down from the slopes of Etna, fleeing eruptions and brigands, and began building in 1558. The lava of 1669 lapped at the walls and the 1693 earthquake brought everything down: only three monks survived. The rebuilding, from 1702, was even grander.
In 1866 the monastery was confiscated and became a barracks, a school, an observatory and the city library: the dome of the round hall in front of the refectory was even raised by five meters for the astronomical observatory, and returned to its original height only in 1981. In 1977 it passed to the University, which had it restored by the architect Giancarlo De Carlo.
The south and east facades are a showcase of late Sicilian Baroque: scrolls, flowers, fruit, putti, nymphs and monstrous masks around every window and balcony, the work of stonecutters who came from all over the island to rebuild the city. In 1773 the Scottish traveler Patrick Brydone called it the "Sicilian Versailles."
Inside are two large cloisters. The Marble Cloister, the oldest, has white marble columns and a 17th-century fountain; the eastern one is a garden with the Caffeaos at its center, a Neo-Gothic pavilion covered in colorful majolica tiles. Between the two runs the clock corridor, 214 meters long.
Also worth seeing are Vaccarini's great refectory, with a vault so high it looks like a church, and, in the basement, the mosaics of a Roman domus, discovered during the restoration and viewed from a suspended walkway.
Next door stands the Church of San Nicolò l'Arena, larger than the Cathedral, with its facade left unfinished, the great organ by Donato Del Piano and a meridian line 40 meters long.
The monks came down from the slopes of Etna, fleeing eruptions and brigands, and began building in 1558. The lava of 1669 lapped at the walls and the 1693 earthquake brought everything down: only three monks survived. The rebuilding, from 1702, was even grander.
In 1866 the monastery was confiscated and became a barracks, a school, an observatory and the city library: the dome of the round hall in front of the refectory was even raised by five meters for the astronomical observatory, and returned to its original height only in 1981. In 1977 it passed to the University, which had it restored by the architect Giancarlo De Carlo.