Certosa di Padula

Founded in 1306 and built over four centuries, the Certosa di San Lorenzo covers about fifty-one thousand square metres, one of the largest monastic complexes in Europe, with three hundred and twenty rooms and halls. The great cloister is among the biggest in the world, enclosed by eighty-four columns, and an elliptical double-helix staircase of stone climbs from it to the library. A story, unverifiable, says a thousand-egg omelette was made here for Charles V in 1535. Carthusian monks lived in individual cells with their own gardens. UNESCO listed it in 1998 with Paestum and Velia.

History

Tommaso di San Severino founded the charterhouse on 27 April 1306 on the site of an earlier monastery and dedicated it to Saint Lawrence, and building went on for some 450 years, though the main parts are Baroque; it covers 51,500 square metres with 320 rooms and halls, the largest monastery in Italy, and its great cloister of 12,000 square metres is ringed by 84 columns. Carthusian life was divided between contemplation, in the cloisters, library and chapels with their 18th-century scagliola altar fronts, and work, in the kitchen, cellars, laundries and yards with stables, ovens and an olive mill. The charterhouse was the French headquarters in the Napoleonic Wars, a base of Garibaldi's Southern Army in the Risorgimento and an internment camp in both world wars, and in 1917 the Czechoslovak Legion in Italy was founded here; today it also holds the archaeological museum of Western Lucania (Wikipedia, Certosa di Padula).

What you'll find

• The great cloister - a court enclosed by 84 columns.
• The spiral staircase - an elliptical stone double helix to the library.
• The monks' cells - individual houses with private gardens.
• The kitchens - vast service rooms including the famous omelette story.

When to go

April to October; the complex is largely unheated and cold in winter. It closes some Mondays. Allow two hours minimum for the scale.

Things to know

Much of the complex is bare and unfurnished after suppressions and looting. It is very large and tiring. The Vallo di Diano is remote without a car.

Nearby

The Pertosa caves lie north; Pollino park is southeast.

Key facts