MeMo and MeMo-ViAM featured at the conference Dalle opere al mito. Storia e memoria di Montecassino medievale

The memory of Montecassino is not confined to the preservation of its material heritage; it continues to be renewed through ongoing research. This was one of the central themes of the conference Dalle opere al mito. Storia e memoria di Montecassino medievale, organised by the Sapienza University of Rome research unit within the MeMo-ViAM – Memory of Montecassino. Virtual and Accessible Museum project, in collaboration with the Bibliotheca Hertziana – Max Planck Institute for Art History. Held from 23 to 25 June 2026, the conference brought together scholars from Italian and international universities and research institutions to explore the many ways in which Montecassino’s heritage is studied, interpreted and enhanced today.

Within this framework, particular attention was devoted to the projects developed at the University of Cassino and Southern Lazio. During the afternoon session of 24 June, presentations were given on MeMo-ViAM – Memory of Montecassino. Virtual and Accessible Museum by Giulia Orofino, Ivana Bruno and Andrea Improta, and on MeMo – Memory of Montecassino, by Marilena Maniaci and Nicola Tangari.

Rather than focusing on a single achievement, the presentation devoted to MeMo offered an opportunity to reflect on the project’s development over the years, retracing its principal lines of research, the collaborations it has fostered and the contribution made by the many scholars, researchers and early-career researchers involved at different stages of its activities. It presented MeMo as a project that has progressively grown through the dialogue between different areas of expertise, successfully integrating historical and philological research, scholarly cataloguing, digitisation and the development of tools for the enhancement of Montecassino’s written heritage.

The joint presence of MeMo and MeMo-ViAM also highlighted how research on the Abbey is now developing along complementary lines. Coordinated by the University of Cassino and Southern Lazio and carried out in collaboration with the research units of Sapienza University of Rome and the University of Campania “Luigi Vanvitelli”, MeMo-ViAM extends its focus to the artistic and museum heritage of Montecassino and to virtual reconstruction, while MeMo concentrates on the Abbey’s documentary and manuscript heritage. Together, the two projects outline a framework in which different disciplines, methodologies and technologies converge towards an increasingly comprehensive and integrated understanding of Montecassino’s history.

Included within a programme featuring leading specialists in medieval history, art history, archaeology and philology, the presentations dedicated to the two projects confirmed that Montecassino continues to represent an open and interdisciplinary research laboratory. A memory that belongs not only to the past, but also continues to generate new knowledge, new research tools and new perspectives for future scholarship.