The ancient path (the paved or “silicate” road as locally called) that leads from Cassino to the Monastery extends for about 1.5 km, and is mostly covered by the characteristic pavement in ancient Roman paving.

The construction of the “carriage road” (via Montecassino), whose works ended in 1887, also affected the historical path as it ended up intersecting it in some points. Ultimately the “carriage road” interrupted it, cutting it into various sections.
Access to the first section is at the hairpin bend of “Quota 202”, where an information panel of the CAI is located.
The path of the ancient path was marked by various chapels, tombstones, churches, crosses, aedicules raised for various reasons on its edges.
Most of these artifacts have disappeared (X) due to wars and destruction and only a few survive today (●).
Starting from Cassino they cross or cross:
(X) chapel of San Mauro (erected to commemorate the farewell of St. Mauro from St. Benedict on his departure for evangelization in France; the chapel was demolished in the mid-1700s having become a “shelter for beasts”);
(X) chapel which later became the small church of Santa Scolastica (the inhabitants of San Germano went there in procession to beg for rain in periods of drought);
(X) chapel of Santa Croce (called “Santa Crocella”, also known as “the three chapels”, where, according to tradition, St. Benedict fell on a boulder while climbing on the back of a mule but without being injured since the stone was made like wax and the thigh of the mule that had repaired it was imprinted on it. The chapel was also linked to the memory of other miracles performed by St. Benedict such as that of wine or that of the healing of a sick person and for this reason they had been the two side chapels have been added. Over the centuries various miracles have occurred in that place while the dust removed from the upper part of the stone was used by the people against [malarial] fevers. Pope Celestine V stopped at the chapel to pray, visiting to the monastery in 1294, which granted an indulgence of one hundred years and one hundred quarantines);

● Tombstone of d. Angelo Tosti (it is a boulder about a meter high which in the face facing the path shows this phrase-prayer:
“[Our father
Who [you are] in heaven
[Affratell] to us England
[In] the unity of faith “
Tradition in Montecassino attributes the phrase to the important monk and historian of Cassino Don Angelo Tosti. There are two distinct versions of the reasons that led to engrave the phrase on the boulder. The first refers to the sudden conversion to Catholicism of an English scholar of the Anglican religion. guest in Montecassino in the 1880s. During his stay he had the opportunity to discuss religious issues with d. Angelo Tosti, discussing Catholicism and Anglicanism. When the scholar left, the Cassinese monk wanted to accompany him to the Cassino station. Along the path, having reached the height of the boulder, the Anglican stopped and said to him: “Father, from this moment I am a Roman Catholic: you have convinced me”. The second version wants, instead, that d. Angelo Tosti dictated the sentence when, under the pontificate of Leo XIII, a current of thought developed which called for the rapprochement of the Anglicans to the Roman Church. Originally together with the engraving of the sentence, a cross was planted on the boulder that no longer exists as it was destroyed by shrapnel during the Second World War that hit the same boulder on the left side and at the top, shattering parts of written);(X) chapel located in S. Severo (built at the beginning of the eleventh century by the abbot Teobaldo, 1022-1035, dedicated to the bishop of the ancient Casinum, in a place that was commonly called “at the vault of S. Severo ». It was demolished in 1821);

● “cross of the knee” (the cross is placed on a base of squared stones. Below there is a small boulder that shows, protected by an iron grate, a hollow. According to tradition, that hollow is the cast of the knee of Saint Benedict that the saint left imprinted when, having reached Monte Venere and looking towards the summit of Monte Cassino, he knelt in prayer to ask God for help, having to begin both the work of evangelization and that of destroying idolatry. tradition when St. Benedict got up he noticed that his knee had created a hollow in the stone leaving its imprint and that was the sign that the Lord would follow him in all his work);
(X) aedicule of the Immaculate Conception (composed of a mosaic raised on a gray granite column, was built by Don Eusebio Grossetti and was placed in the late spring of 1943 but was completely lost due to the war);
● Belvedere cross
● chapel of Sant’Agata (protector of earthquakes, built in the 11th century, destroyed by war and rebuilt).
Bibliographic reference:
Flavio Della Marra, Historical description of the Sacro Real Monistero of Monte Casino, F.lli Raimondi, Naples 1775
Angelo Pantoni, How we climbed to Montecassino in the last century, in «Echi di Montecassino», a. IX (1981) n. 18
Emilio Pistilli, Ancient roads for Montecassino, Lamberti ed., Cassino 1992
Salvatore Capaldi, Paths to Montecassino, presentation by Faustino Avagliano, CAI Cassino, Tipogr. F. Ciolfi, Cassino 2011
The “Tombstone of Tosti”, in “Cassinati Studies”, a. IX, n. 2 April-June 2009, p. 120 http://www.cdsconlus.it/index.php/2016/09/27/la-lapide-di-tosti/