This restoration of monastic life was part of a wider scheme. Reference has been made to the growth of simony, both among laymen and ecclesiastics. The evil had assumed such proportions towards the close of the tenth century that the prestige of the Church was seriously jeopardised. It was a critical epoch, and all depended on exposing the cause of the evil and on stirring men’s consciences with regard to it. Romuald came forward and openly declared that simony was the most damnable heresy, and that no one who had entered the Church for money could hope for salvation unless he gave up his benefice and became a layman. Peter Damian was of opinion that, while no one acted directly in compliance with this request, the stir which Romuald made was great. More than once he was in danger of his life, and the experiences through which he went are full of interesting particulars. At one time he lived for seven years as a hermit, and came back, his body shrivelled, weather-stained and of the colour of a newt. But his cutting himself off from the society of his fellows apparently led to many conversions. At another time he was fired by the wish to take a part in evangelising Hungary. Among the monks he had come across was a son of the Prince of Hungary. But it was not to be. When Romuald and his companions had gone some way on their journey, sickness overtook them, and sickness returned to the party whenever it attempted to proceed. There was nothing left to do but give up the undertaking and return to Italy.
Romuald’s fame was at its height when the Emperor Heinrich II. crossed the Alps in 1022. So much was he moved by Romuald that he expressed the wish that his soul were in the saint’s body. Romuald’s appearance at the time was peculiar. Hoary, unkempt and unwashed, he came to court wearing a dirty, shaggy skin. The Germans crowded round in the hope of snatching a few hairs from it, which they wished to preserve as relics.
Romuald first came to Camaldoli about the year 1018. It has been affirmed and denied that the site of the monastery was a gift to him from a certain Count Maldolo, and that the name Camaldoli represents the words Casa Malduli. The saint never stayed here long, and he died away from here in his hermit’s cell at Val de Castro in 1027. But the routine of life at Camaldoli was held to represent his aspirations, and Camaldoli gave its name to all the monasteries which Romuald had founded. These were never numerous. The order did not spread much beyond Italy and the south of France. But within these limits it exerted considerable influence.
And thus attended by thoughts of the enthusiast who laid the foundations of this vast establishment so many hundreds of years ago, we entered the building by a long arched stone passage, which led up from the garden without to the courtyard within. This courtyard is said to date from the tenth century; I have rarely seen one more impressive through the stern simplicity and perfect balance of its proportions. It is built throughout of the same grey stone, and there is little attempt at ornamentation. Pillars with slightly swelled shafts and simple capitals support round arches which extend round the four sides of a paved court. In the centre of this court stands a fountain with an unceasing flow of water. Passages, staircases and narrow corridors lead off in different directions. Surely there could be nothing more suited to the solitary side of one’s nature than to sit on one of the huge logs of wood that lay on one side of the court, listening to the flow of the water and watching the clouds that floated across the opening above. Now and again there was the sound of voices and of footsteps coming and going in the far distance. A man carried faggots across the court, a woman came to wash lettuces at the fountain—living figures that moved in the round of duty and seemed to emphasise the old-world solitude of the place. There is no greater solitude than an open-air solitude from which the life of nature is excluded. And within these walls there was no sign of animal or vegetable life—nothing to remind one of the stirring of the sap or the beating of a pulse, except that of which one was conscious of in one’s self.
That night we had the vast hotel of Camaldoli to ourselves. In the springtime there are few visitors. We ate and slept in some rooms off the
COURTYARD OF CAMALDOLI
ancient courtyard. We wandered into the roomy church. One of the old monks had died that afternoon, and prayers were being offered for his salvation. We met the bier as it was carried out from the church.
Like other monasteries, Camaldoli has experienced many vicissitudes in times of war and in times of peace. Throughout the Middle Ages it remained a famous goal for pilgrimages, and its woodland air and mountain freshness made it a favourite health resort. The converts to the order were at first devoted to outdoor pursuits—the hermits in their little gardens tended plants that were used for making drugs, and the monks were devoted to the culture of the forests. Later, they contracted a taste for learning, and a famous library was collected, chiefly by Ambrogio Traversari, who took an important place in the early Italian Renaissance. Of this intellectual life no trace remains. The books were scattered at the beginning of this century. Some are at Poppi, others are at Florence, and the love of letters is dead. But with the older achievements time has dealt more sparingly. A pharmacy still makes part of the settlement, and the surrounding forest retains the fame of being one of the finest in Europe. When the Government appropriated Camaldoli, the traditions of the monks regarding the cultivation of the trees were carried on, and Vallombrosa, the monastery on the further side of the Pratomagno, was turned into a school of forestry. All the forests throughout the district were placed under its care, and thus the great fir trees, the abete of Camaldoli, its chestnut groves, and its beech and oak forests have preserved some of their old grandeur.