Abbey of San Giovanni in Venere

The Abbey of San Giovanni in Venere (Italian: "Abbey of St. John in Venus") is a monastery complex in the comune of Fossacesia, in Abruzzo, central Italy. it is located on a hill facing the Adriatic Sea, at 107 m over the sea level.

It includes a basilica and the monastery proper, both built in the early 13th century on a pre-existing convent.

The reference to Venus derives from the traditional presence of a temple of the goddess in the site, which would have been built in 80 BC. Portus Veneris was the name of a Byzantine landing place at the mouth of the Sangro river (the Byzantines controlled parts of southern Italy until the 11th century).

Again according to tradition, the origins of the monastery were connected to a small cellarius (small recovery) for Benedictine monks, with a chapel, built by one Martin around 540 AD by demolishing the temple. Recent excavations have showed the presence of an early construction and tombs dating from the 6th-7th centuries. The first document mentioning Sancti Johannes in foce de fluvio Sangro (St. John's near the Sangro mouth) dates from 829.

The monastery expanded around the year 1000. Thrasimund I and Thrasimund II, Counts of Chieti, had the cellarius enlarged into an abbey depending from Monte Cassino, and made extensive donations to it. In 1043 the abbey was placed under imperial protection. Around 1060, abbot Oderisius I, fearing an advance of the Normans towards Chieti, fortified the monastery and founded the castrum (castle) of Rocca San Giovanni.

In the 12th century the abbey reached the climax of its splendour. In 1165 abbot Oderisius II had a new church built and the monastery further enlarged. While the former, apart sculptures and canvasses, is still the same, the latter is today only a small fraction of the edifice: in the year 1200 it housed 80-120 Benedictines monks, it has several studios, laboratories, a large library and a rich archive (whose texts are now in Rome), two cloisters, a bakery, an ambulatory, stables a recovery for pilgrims and much other features.

...
Wikipedia