Monastery of Santo Spirito, Medieval monastery in Agrigento, Italy

The Monastery of Santo Spirito is a medieval monastery in Agrigento featuring Chiaramonte-style architecture. The building contains a Gothic portal entrance, a cloister with central garden, and distinctive windows with pointed arches throughout.

The monastery was founded in 1299 by the marchioness Rosalia Prefoglio, wife of Federico I di Chiaramonte, and given to Cistercian Benedictine nuns; it was placed under Casamari's supervision from 1299 to 1572. In 1866 a royal decree turned it into an orphanage and poorhouse, and in 1916 the State entrusted it to Agrigento's municipality. After wartime use as an arms depot, it became the civic museum.

Locals call the monastery "Bataranni", from the Sicilian for "great abbey", a reference to its size. Cistercian nuns returned here after the Second World War, when three sisters came from San Severino Marche to keep the community alive, and the cloister was re-established in 1964. Concerts are often held in the former dormitory hall.

The complex is entered from the historic centre of Agrigento; the ground-floor cloister, with its 14th-century fountain, is reached along the outer corridor, and the museum rooms occupy the first and second floors. The dormitory hall is used by the municipal administration for concerts and musical events, while temporary exhibitions are occasionally held in the refectory, so some rooms may be closed to visitors.

The refectory's rear wall has a large two-light window, while the chapter house holds a raised crypt found during restoration work in 1989; it is thought to contain Isabella, widow of Andrea, beheaded in Palermo, who took the veil here and died in 1434. The dormitory above keeps a 17th-century wooden coffered ceiling.