History

The monastery, founded in the 6^th century, was at first male, but by 1031, having incorporated and amalgamated the two female monasteries of Sta Maria in Celeseo and S. Martino, it became female under the rule of an abbess.

A unique feature of the monastery’s archives consists in the existence of a practically uninterrupted list of abbesses, both while it was Sta Maria ad Celeseo, and after 1031. This shows both the close association of the monastery with the ruling families of the aristocracy of Ravenna and its archbishop, to whom several of the abbesses were related and interconnected in economic terms, to manage and cultivate considerable estates in the province of Romagna.