If you happen to be travelling in Basilicata to visit Matera, I recommend a little detour by car all the way to Venosa. Besides the archaeological park with its Roman houses, baths and even an amphitheatre, you’ll be able to walk among the crumbling walls of the ancient abbey of Venosa and discover its story, which is truly fascinating.
I’ve always found these places, where human work merges with nature, spellbinding. The abbey’s floor has been entirely replaced by a thick carpet of grass, while its roof is now the sky. I love them because they remind me of “my” church at Castel Santa Maria.
The abbey of Venosa will probably bring to mind the splendid abbey of San Galgano, but the story of these two sacred places was completely different. While San Galgano’s decline was caused by slow abandonment and neglect, the abbey of Venosa was never actually completed.
Why? What happened?
Don’t worry: you’ll find all the information and the most interesting curiosities right here in the post below.
If you enjoy discovering the stories of these ancient medieval buildings, I also recommend reading:
- The sad story of San Galgano and the sword in the stone
- What to see outside Paris: the ruins of the abbey of Soissons
One last thing: don’t forget to take at least a stroll through the town itself. I’m sure you’ll find it really lovely and, if you’re keen on medieval castles, the castle of Venosa is not only very large but also very well preserved.
At Venosa you’ll be able to walk through the centuries, retracing the building phases of its monuments, the history of the peoples who lived here and the events that shaped their fate.
Now let me tell you what happened and why the abbey of Venosa was left in this state.
Off we go!
The abbey of Venosa, between Roman remains and Christian churches
Almost all Italian towns share a similar history: they were born as small villages and gradually expanded, often around the oldest core.
That’s not what happened at Venosa, because today’s town is clearly detached from the original settlement, now reduced to the archaeological remains you can visit. The present town developed differently, thanks to the medieval and Renaissance works that drew it away from ancient Roman Venusia.
Since antiquity this place enjoyed a certain opulence thanks to its proximity to the Appian Way, becoming a hub of trade and commerce. The Roman archaeological remains at Venosa still bear witness to that wealth.
What is there to see?
An amphitheatre, some baths and several sizeable domus have emerged from this land, of which we still preserve precious mosaics.
The archaeological park of Venosa isn’t huge, but it gives you the sense of walking through the centuries, along an intricate labyrinth of streets, right into the houses where our ancestors lived. It reminded me a lot of the archaeological park of Paestum: if you’ve never been, I really recommend going.
But the story that will strike you most is that of the abbey of Venosa.
Now let me tell you what happened!
Between the late 5th and early 6th century, an early Christian complex with a basilica rose at Venosa, built by reusing the remains of older Roman buildings (a domus and a bath complex). According to local tradition, a pagan temple stood here even earlier; it’s a fascinating tale, though hard to document. The ancient church can still be visited, and inside you’ll find important remains of mosaics and the oldest foundations.
After the barbarian invasions, the town and the church came under Lombard rule, which began the first works on the sanctuary, with the typical stylised decorations still visible today in the portico.
But it was with the arrival of the Normans, between the 11th and 12th centuries, that everything changed. The ancient church was consecrated in 1059 and, shortly after, the Norman Hauteville family decided to make this Benedictine monastery one of the most important in southern Italy, launching the construction of an even more majestic building.
Unfortunately, things did not go as planned.
Here’s why!
The Hautevilles and the unfinished abbey of Venosa
Inside the church of the Holy Trinity in Venosa lie the tombs of very important members of the Hauteville family. Among them are the Norman commander Robert Guiscard and his first wife Alberada, in beautiful monumental tombs. Here too rest Guiscard’s elder brothers, protagonists of the Norman conquest of the South: the Trinity of Venosa was, in effect, the dynasty’s mausoleum.
The Hauteville family ruled the South for over a century, and the importance of this centre led them to press the monks to enlarge the abbey of Venosa. So, in the 12th century, the expansion works began, extending the apse well beyond the original church.
The new church of Venosa was meant to be enormous, to hold a great number of the faithful: it was designed over a surface of more than 2,000 square metres, with a wide transept and a three-apsed choir.
History, however, took a different course.
The abbey of Venosa, a lonely giant
It’s the oldest story in the world. You start with great ideals and majestic plans, sparing no expense, at least until the creditors start knocking at the door.
That’s exactly what happened at Venosa!
The works, begun around the middle of the 12th century, slowed down because of the monastery’s shaky finances. The final blow came when the Benedictines were suppressed by Pope Boniface VIII in 1297 and forced to leave Venosa. The complex then passed to the Knights Hospitaller, the future Knights of Malta, who however moved into the town, leaving the abbey of Venosa to fend for itself and the great building site forever unfinished.
Fortunately, much of the structure has been recovered and today this lonely giant is part of the archaeological park: you can visit it with the same entrance ticket.
Inside, the Romanesque forms are still visible, but the thing that will really amaze you is something else.
While today we tend to preserve ancient structures in their original state, in the Middle Ages it was common to reuse old stones to build new edifices. The monks of the abbey of Venosa adopted this strategy too, and the nearby Roman ruins were a perfect opportunity. If you look carefully at the church walls, you’ll find plenty of stones plainly “borrowed” from the surrounding structures: the marbles taken from the amphitheatre, but also blocks bearing bas-reliefs of clear Roman origin.
There’s more, and it’s the detail I find most moving. Among the reused blocks there are also numerous slabs bearing inscriptions in Hebrew, dating to around the 9th century and coming from a burial area near the amphitheatre. Venosa, in fact, was home to an important Jewish community, of which the evocative Jewish catacombs dug into the Maddalena hill still survive. Walking along the walls of the Incompiuta, in short, you have before you a true palimpsest of peoples: Romans, Christians, Lombards, Normans and Jews, one on top of the other.
When you wander among the unfinished remains of the abbey of Venosa, take your time. Roaming these ruins will fill you with melancholy and leave you only a vague idea of what this monumental work could have become.
The town and the abbey of Venosa today
The abbey of Venosa was one of the most important in southern Italy, and to this day it remains one of the most significant in Basilicata. But the town is not famous only for this extraordinary building.
Do you know where Horace was born?
Right here in Venosa, on 8 December 65 BC. Quintus Horatius Flaccus, one of the greatest Latin poets, the one behind the famous carpe diem, was the son of a freedman and was born in this Roman colony on the border between Apulia and Lucania. In town you’ll find the so-called House of Horace: in truth these are most likely the remains of a Roman bath building, but tradition has seen in them the poet’s home, and the town honours him with Piazza Orazio and his statue.
Then there’s the Angevin fountain, from 1298, the fountain of Messer Oto, with a Roman lion, and the fountain of San Marco, both from the 14th century. Finding them is very easy, you won’t need to search much!
Among Venosa’s little streets stand various 16th-century palaces, Baroque churches and small alleys. Finally you reach the beautiful castle of Pirro del Balzo, from 1470, which today houses the National Archaeological Museum “Mario Torelli”, completely renovated in 2021.
Here’s a curiosity!
In town there’s also the so-called column of friendship of Venosa, also from Roman times: according to tradition it guarantees eternal friendship if you walk around it holding hands. I find it a very romantic thing to do with someone you’re especially fond of.
Practical information for visiting Venosa
These stones still have so many stories to tell and, without an expert of the place, you risk not only failing to give them their due, but also missing very interesting details.
Inside the Roman baths, for example, you’ll be able to make out the changing room and the fine mosaic of the frigidarium, while in the tepidarium and calidarium you’ll find the old furnaces that heated the water. Basilicata, as everyone knows, is not a land rich in water, and building baths might have seemed a gamble: that’s why, as early as the 2nd century, the Romans had built two cisterns with a large central basin to collect rainwater.
The route takes in the amphitheatre, the church of the Holy Trinity and, as a grand finale, the unfinished abbey of Venosa. With the same ticket you can also visit the museum in the castle.
A few useful details, always to be double-checked before you set off:
- Tickets: entry to the archaeological park is about €3, the museum about €4, a combined museum + park ticket about €5 (a “circuit” ticket including the Melfi museum too is around €6). Free on the first Sunday of the month.
- Hours: generally every day 9:00 am-8:00 pm, with Tuesday open only in the afternoon (2:00 pm-8:00 pm).
- Getting there: Venosa is about an hour by car from Matera and a little more from Potenza; it’s the perfect choice for a day trip while exploring Basilicata.
And if you want to round off the day in style, remember that Venosa is the home of Aglianico del Vulture DOC, one of the great reds of the South: a winery visit with tasting is the best way to let the land speak too, not just the stones.
And you - would you like to walk beneath the open sky of this cathedral that was never finished, or have you already had the good fortune to lose yourself among the ruins of Venosa?
