Meet Montserrat

Montserrat, undoubtedly, has an exceptional morphology and character. Due to its particularities, Montserrat has earned the status of natural gem and spiritual site. Its characteristics and privileged position have attracted all kinds of people, as well as being an element of dispute and controversy.

The treasure and, apparently, the cause for constructing an abbey in the mountain is no other than the very image of the Virgin. The legend tells that some peasants found an image of the Virgin Mary in a cave of that mountain. The image, some say, weighted so much that it was impossible to take it to a sacred space. The archbishop interpreted that a church was to be built where that image was found. From that historical church of Saint Mary, did the whole Montserrat abbey sprout.

The mythical image of the Virgin was lost and gave way to the current image of the Virgin of Montserrat, the “Moreneta”. This statue, which is prayed upon from the 12th century, has a black skin: that’s the reason of her alias. Nevertheless, in her origin the statue was not painted in black. The low quality candles that lit it up tanned its surface over time.

Whether the legend is true or not, the places of worship in Montserrat began to develop during the ninth century AD and its fame gradually grows after becoming a major abbey in the twelfth century.

From the fourteenth century to the fifteenth century, the abbey experiences one of its most splendid moments: its basilica dates from this years. Despite it was contemporary of the the Gothic period, the basilica of Montserrat was built following the Renaissance style. Today few elements attest to the sixteenth century basilica, as the Napoleonic troops burned several times the site, leaving unburnt only the central aisle of the basilica.

One hundred years after the fire of 1808, Josep Puig i Cadafalch began the reconstruction of the basilica and, along with other artists of Catalan modernism, worked in the form of the current basilica. Currently, on this wonderful site you can find both the congregation of 76 monks, as the Choir of Montserrat, Europe's oldest singing school.