Probatus

With the benefit of his local connections he oversaw a great expansion of the abbey's properties through grants and purchases, and also rationalised its holdings to create a robust base for an early medieval monastic community.

He immediately attracted royal patronage: by 772 the abbey had received three curtes (some type of house) and one monasteria (a church with a monastic community) that had previously belonged to Queen Ansa, a gift to her from her son, Adelchis.

Likewise the threat of war may have influenced Duke Hildeprand of Spoleto to procure divine favour or vouchsafe his land to God by donating it to the abbey.

[3] In 773, before April, Desiderius was pressuring Rome with his army when Pope Hadrian I sent a delegation led by Probatus and twenty of his senior monks to deal with the king.

Probatus' embassy can be viewed as an effort, ultimately unsuccessful, to preserve the political order and its peace ("to save Desiderius from himself [since] many in the duchy [of Spoleto] did not share the Lombard king's confidence in his own military strength").

According to the Libellus constructionis Farfensis, Pope Hadrian had ordered that disputes between Farfa and some men from Rome be settled by his prior vestiarius, Miccio.

[11] In 777–78 Probatus was able to construct a three-kilometre aqueduct for the abbey by convincing landowners to make pro anima gifts (for the sake of the soul) of the requisite land.