L’Hermitage of St Michael is one of the landmarks of the Campagna area. It is located, as the official City of Campagna ETS association records, on the southern slope of Monte Nero (Montenero), about 1,110 metres above sea level, on the border between the municipalities of Campagna and Oliveto Citra. The hermitage is carved into a natural cavity in the rock and dominates from above the Trigento valley and, further in the distance, the vast scenery of the Sele valley and the Picentini mountains.
The Wikipedia entry “Avigliano (Campagna)” describes the Hermitage as a «small Benedictine monastery contained in the hollow of a very high cliff», located at an altitude of about 1,000 metres and reachable by paths that start from the village of Avigliano or the hamlet of Puglietta. Inside the cave is a small church with altar and, connected to it, service rooms that testify to the stable presence of hermits and religious people over the centuries.
According to the reconstruction by Cristian Viglione for Città di Campagna ETS, the origins of the place are ancient and intertwined with the events of the hamlet of Sant'Angelo di Furano: around the 1240, after a violent Longobard attack, part of the survivors, led by the nobleman Paolo Carfagno, took refuge on the mountain, erecting a first and rustic little church dedicated to St Michael, former patron of the destroyed hamlet. Over the following centuries, the hermitage underwent progressive extensions, until it assumed the layout that it largely retains today.
Even today, the Hermitage of San Michele is destination for pilgrimages and walks, It is included in the area's nature trails and devotional paths. The Committee of the Hermitage of St. Michael, to which the Cathedral Chapter entrusted the management of the site in the early 20th century, looks after the traditional processions in May and September and keeps alive a devotion that makes the hermitage one of the main points of reference of the “micaelico path” in Campania.
The entry dedicated to Avigliano (Campagna) provides some valuable information on the internal structure and historical evolution of the hermitage. It is defined as «small Benedictine monastery», carved into the hollow of a cliff at very high altitude. Inside the cave is a little church, in front of which is a tomb erected in the 16th century by the nobleman Paolo Carfagno. On this tomb stands the family coat of arms, depicting a boar (a vepre), considered by heraldic bibliography to be a rare depiction in the Italian context.
Next to the church, excavated or set into the rock, are other small roomsthree small rooms, an oratory and a kitchen built of mortar and stone. The same voice recalls that, in the course of time, the hermitage came to have eight small rooms, five kitchens and a refectory, testifying to a community life that, although in the essential form typical of rock hermitages, included periods of prolonged stay by religious and hermits.
From 1630 the hermitage underwent important restoration and extension work. Città di Campagna ETS emphasises the role of a prelate from Oliveto Citra, Belbuono, who ceded the entire complex with its plot of land to the Cathedral Chapter of Campagna. The Chapter took charge of the structural work, facing considerable logistical and economic difficulties to consolidate the access and make it safer. The will of the faithful and the prelates, the record shows, was decisive for the survival of the sacred place.
In 1748 was realised, as Wikipedia again reminds us, a steps with parapet consisting of about sixty steps, preceded by a stone cross on a column placed in the clearing in front of the entrance. Inside are marble tablets of the Stations of the Cross dated 1672. These interventions, together with the residential and service areas, outline the face of the hermitage as a place of retreat, prayer and reception of pilgrims between the modern and contemporary ages.
In the religious memory of Campagna, the Hermitage of St Michael is linked to the attendance of numerous bishops and the figure of Juan Caramuel y Lobkowitz, one of the protagonists of seventeenth-century European cultural history. The City of Campagna records that the hermitage hosted, among others, bishops De Luca, Fontana, Caramuel, Cesarano and Giuseppe Maria Palatucci. In particular, Caramuel, a lover of the tranquillity that he could not find in the town centre, is said to have stayed for a long time in these mountain environments, working on philosophical and mathematical themes that later came together in the “Mathesis biceps”, a work in which he elaborated the binary numeration system. A plaque, still visible today, commemorates his passage.
Local religious tradition intertwines the history of the hermitage with a strong-coloured legend, also reported by Città di Campagna ETS. Originally, it is said, the cave was the home of the devil. One May day in the early 10th century, St Michael, dressed as a shepherd, is said to have asked the devil to visit the grotto and the entire mountain; before leaving, he placed four stones on the ground, forming a cross. At the sight of the symbol, the evil one is said to have uttered heartrending cries and fled as far as the Lauropiano locality, leaving his claw marks on the rock.
The story continues with the apparition of the archangel to a cowherd from Puglietta: one of the shepherd's bulls entered the cavern and forced him to climb up to the cave, where the man saw a young man enveloped in shining light in the place where the altar would later be erected. Returning to the valley, the shepherd reported the incident to the ecclesiastical authorities and the fame of the apparition quickly spread, turning the cave into a place of pilgrimage.
From the beginning of the 20th century, the management of the hermitage was entrusted by the Chapter to the St. Michael's Hermitage Committee, which still maintains it today and organises the two traditional annual processions, in May and September, dedicated to the «Capo delle Schiere Angeliche». Thanks to the work of the Committee and numerous volunteers, the hermitage is now perfectly preserved and included in the regional micaelic routes, a meeting point between spirituality, the mountain landscape and the history of the town of Campagna.
