Subiaco is a comune (municipality) in the Metropolitan City of Rome Capital, in the Italian region of Latium, 40 kilometres (25 mi) from Tivoli alongside the River Aniene.

When St. Benedict, at the age of fourteen (c. 494), retired from the world and lived for three years in a cave above the River Aniene, he was supplied with the necessaries of life by a monk, St. Roman.

Abbot John V, created cardinal by Pope Gregory VII, made the grotto the terminus of a yearly procession, built a new road, and had the altars reconsecrated.

On October 27, 1909, Pius X granted a daily plenary indulgence to those who received Holy Communion there and pray according to the intention of the pope (Acta.

The Abbey of St. Scolastica, located about a mile and a half below the grotto, was built originally by St Benedict about 520, and endowed by the Roman patricians, Tertullus and Æquitius.

In 1052, Leo IX came to Subiaco to settle various disputes and to correct abuses; a similar visit was made by Gregory VII.

Special favour was shown by Paschal II, who took the abbey from the jurisdiction of the Bishop of Tivoli and made it an abbacy nullius.

Urban VI (1378–1389) abolished the position of abbot for life, withdrew from the monks the right of election, and made the administration and revenues the responsibility of a member of the Curia.

The first of these was the Spanish Cardinal Juan de Torquemada and the second Roderigo Borgia (later Alexander VI), who remodeled the Castrum Sublacence, once the summer resort of the popes, and made it the residence of the commendatory abbot.

One example, Pompeo Colonna, Bishop of Rieti, commendatory abbot since 1506, squandered the goods of the abbey and gave the income to people described as unworthy subjects.

In the first years of the 20th century, the Subiaco area was improved by national investment in infrastructure, with the connection to a railway, a hydroelectric plant and an aqueduct.