The New International Encyclopædia/Farfa, Abbey of

FAR′FA, Abbey of. A Benedictine monastery, at one time among the richest and most famous of Italy, situated not far from Rome. It was founded in the middle of the sixth century by Saint Laurence, Bishop of Spoleto, and soon reached a position of importance, receiving endowments from the Lombard and Carolingian rulers and from the popes. The monks were driven out by the Saracen invaders in the closing years of the ninth century, and it lay desolate for fifty years. When Alberic set Odo of Cluny over all the monasteries in the neighborhood of Rome, attempts were made at reforming the ill-regulated lives of the monks, but at first without success. The zealous Abbot Hugo, however, brought in a new set of monks at the end of the tenth century, and Odilo of Cluny, visiting Italy, inspired him to introduce the Cluniac reform. Pope Nicholas II. consecrated the conventual church in 1060, and learning began to flourish in a marked degree. The librarian of the monastery, Gregory of Catina, rendered a great service to Italian history by compiling between 1105 and 1119 the Chronicon Farfense. The riches of the abbey increased greatly, and no less than 683 churches and houses were said to have been subject to the abbot. From the end of the fourteenth century it was held in commendam by cardinals, and Gregory XVI. annexed it in 1842 to the Cardinal-Bishopric of Sabina. Consult Marocco, Istoria del celebre imperial monasterio farfense (Rome, 1834).