We went to Morimondo to visit the abbey.
Following the covid lockdown in some days unfortunately the visits are limited to the abbey church while the other monastic buildings are closed.

We then moved to the hamlet of Fallavecchia (photo 36 and following), since the Middle Ages agricultural production center subject to the abbey of Morimondo.

A short note on Fallavecchia:
We do not know if it was an accident and therefore an exceptional situation, but the stable were really too full of dirt and of a nauseating smell.
We walked along many stables and we reiterate that we have never seen such an unclean thing, including the poor animals.

A bit of history:
We report only the history of the abbey, because of course the events of the villages of Morimondo and Fallavecchia are strictly connected with the abbey and the Cistercian monks.

It was founded on October 4, 1134 by a group of monks coming from Morimond (France) and soon became seat of an important Scriptorium.
The location halfway between the rival cities of Milan and Pavia exposed the monastery to frequent raids and looting, the most serious of which, in 1237, caused the abandon of the abbey for a few years.
The ruined abbey rose again when it passed in commendam to the son of Lorenzo the Magnificent, Cardinal Giovanni de 'Medici, then Pope with the name of Leo X.
In 1564 the inlaid choir by Vincenzo Giramo (1520) was moved to the main apse, behind the altar.
The brief but intense abbacy of Antonio Libanorio (1648 - 52) caused a new recovery of the monastic community.
On May 31, 1798, under the Napoleonic oppression, the abbey became a state property, and while the church and the chapter house were entrusted to the parish, the remaining places were auctioned as farm buildings.
In 1917 the part sold to private citizens was purchased by the painter Angelo Comolli who in 1924 sold the west wing to the Municipality.
In 1982 the Municipality purchased the rest of the private part from the Comolli heirs, while the church and the chapter house remained a state property.

The long restorations undertaken after 1982 were completed in 2008.
The abbey is now a regional museum and its management is entrusted to the Abbatia Sancte Marie de Morimundo Foundation.
(summarized from: "Abbeys and Cistercian sites in Italy, 1120-2018" by Silvia Testa and Piero Rimoldi - I ° ed. 2018)

For more info:
www.abbaziamorimondo.it
wikipedia; Abbazia di Morimondo
wikipedia: Morimondo
wikipedia: Fallavecchia