I was finally inside the Monastery of Santa Maria in Valle. This actually houses a UNESCO World Heritage site but I still have to get there. For now, I am still going around the monastery complex. This used to be part of the palace of a local Lombard official. It had the usual structures that a palace of the time would have – that is, church and chapels. Towards the end of the kingdom of the Lombards, this palace was turned into a monastery for nuns which in hindsight makes a little more sense now compared to what it was before. I wasn’t very impressed the monastery itself since it looks like any other old structure. However, the tour bring visitors to the good stuff.

One of the important structures here is the church of Santa Maria in Valle. It isn’t a very large church compared to the ones outside the monastery but I think considering that it was meant to serve just the local official and later the nun of the monastery, I think the size was more than enough. When I entered the church was surprised as to how squeaky clean it was. I would not have mistook this place to be more than a thousand years old. Obviously, large parts of the church have been restored to make it look like this. While it does look nice, it doesn’t have that authenticity since it felt so new. I was thinking if I was missing something here.

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