Il Goleto is a rural area located at around 600 metres above sea level, near the sources of the Ofanto river, on the border between the municipalities of Sant’Angelo dei Lombardi, Nusco, and Lioni.

In the early 12th century, the young hermit Guglielmo, en route to the Holy Land after pilgrimages to Santiago de Compostela and Rome, followed the Via Appia and stopped in Irpinia, where he first founded the Abbey of Montevergine and later the monastic citadel of the Santissimo Salvatore here at Goleto, beginning in 1133. To build the latter, Guglielmo was granted a vast tract of land by Ruggero, the Norman lord of nearby Monticchio.

The complex was built largely using reclaimed materials from a pre-existing Roman settlement once owned by Marcus Paccius Marcellus. Flanking the original church rose an innovative ‘double monastery’, with two wings and two cloisters—the larger of which was reserved for the nuns. In this newly founded religious community, the supreme authority was held by the abbess, while the monks were entrusted with liturgical duties and manual labour.

Guglielmo never reached the Holy Land. He died in Irpinia, here at Goleto, on 24 June 1142. Eight hundred years after his death, in 1942, Pius XII proclaimed him Principal Patron of Irpinia.