Sacro Eremo e Monastero di Camaldoli

In 1012, four centuries after the founding of the Benedictine order, St. Romualdo—feeling that his order had become too permissive—came to the forests of the Casentino and found their remoteness, beauty, and silence more conducive to religious contemplation. He stayed and founded this hermitage, which was named for Count Maldoli, who donated the land, and which became the seat of a reformed Benedictine order. An important requirement of the new order was preserving its ascetic atmosphere: "If the hermits are to be true devotees of solitude, they must take the greatest care of the woods." When the flow of pilgrims began to threaten that solitude, Romualdo had a monastery and hospital built down the mountain to create some distance. Today, you can view the hermitage—where the monks live in complete silence in 20 separate little cottages, each with its own walled garden—through gates and visit the church and original cell of Romualdo, the model for all the others.