Just 20 minutes by water bus from St. Mark’s Square (Venice) is the Island of San Lazzaro degli Armeni, a mysterious place that houses a monastery where the Armenian Mechitarist Fathers still live. The island of San Lazzaro degli Armeni is the island that hosted Lord Byron. In its marvellous gardens the monks still cultivate roses with whose petals they have been producing for centuries a very fragrant jam. The library, composed of several rooms, contains about 170,000 volumes, of which 4,500 are manuscripts, a place full of mystery and legends, including one in particular according to which there is a volume bound in human skin.
In the 9th century the Benedictines of Sant’Ilario lived here. Later the island was used as a home for the sick and as a leprosarium; it was then abandoned and remained desolate until the early 1700s, when it was identified by Father Mechitar as the ideal place to build a monastery.
In reality Father Mechitar, founder of the order that today takes his name, was fleeing, together with his confraternity, from Armenia, persecuted by the Turks.
The then Republic of Venice, granted the Order to settle on the Island of San Lazzaro, which at that time was in a serious state of abandonment. The monks rearranged everything and transformed the already existing structures into a beautiful convent.
A place little known but worth a visit!
