Cassino historical timeline

Cassino's roots lie in Casinum, the last city of the Latins, of Umbrian or Venetic or Oscan origin, sited atop the hill near Monte Cairo. In Roman times the town was called Casinum; according to Marcus Terentius Varro, in his De lingua Latina, the name derives from the Oscan word cascum, meaning "ancient".

Casinum passed first to the Volscians and then to the Samnites, and the Romans eventually took control of it and its territory, establishing a fortified Latin colony in 312 BC. During the Roman era the most venerated god was Apollo, whose temple rose on Montecassino, where the abbey stands today. Hannibal passed near Casinum at least once during the Punic Wars, and a villa here is presumed to have belonged to Varro himself.

Then came Benedict. He settled among the ruins of the acropolis of Casinum, destroyed the image of Apollo and the pagan altars, and sanctified the place in the name of St John the Baptist. From that moment on he never left Montecassino: he founded the monastery that became a model for Western monasticism and one of the major cultural centres of Europe throughout the Middle Ages, and he wrote the Rule, containing the precepts for his monks. Meanwhile the population built a village called Castellum Sancti Petri.

Its strategic position drew war repeatedly. In 577 a Lombard raid led by Zotto forced the monks to leave Monte Cassino and take refuge in Rome; they returned only after more than a century. In 744, thanks to a donation by Gisulf II of Benevento, the monastery became the capital of a new state, the Terra Sancti Benedicti. The town was re-founded by Abbot Bertharius and called Eulogimenopolis, Greek for "city of Saint Benedict". In 883 monastery and town were attacked again, this time by Saracens, and Bertharius was killed along with other monks.

The abbey was rebuilt in 949 by decision of Pope Agapetus II and, with the town, renamed San Germano after Saint Germanus of Capua, entering a prosperous period. The castle of Rocca Janula was built for defence and still dominates the town. In the abbey are conserved the Placiti Cassinesi, dated 960–963 and considered the first documents ever written in the Italian language.

On 23 July 1230 the peace between Pope Gregory IX and Frederick II was signed here, in the church of San Germano. On 9 September 1349 San Germano was destroyed by a large earthquake which also seriously damaged the abbey; reconstruction followed in 1366 at the will of Pope Urban V.

In 1504, during the Second Italian War, the French tried and failed to take the town. In May 1815 it was the setting of the final battle of the Neapolitan War.

And in 1944 came the Battle of Monte Cassino, which caused huge Allied and German casualties and the nearly total destruction of the town. Cassino was completely rebuilt after the war.