Complex Benedictine San Nicolò l'Arena, consisting of the church and monastery, located in Piazza Dante. The Monastery, second in size only to that of the city of Mafra in Portugal, is a grand old building with facades decorated with an endless series of scrolls, flowers, fruits, monstrous masks, putti and nymphs that frame the windows and balcony. From Baroque portal overlooking Piazza Dante, leads to the first of the two courtyards with arcades cloisters, after which you can see one staircase with two flights, sumptuous and elegant, through which you enter the Monastery, and long corridors, from which you can see the two beautiful cloisters and then visit the cells, the antirefettorio and the refectory. In the times of its greatest splendor, the monastery came to cover an area of 100,000 square meters, with large spaces for the monks, an archaeological museum, an extensive library, a botanical garden, etc.. Since 1977 the monastery is the home of the Faculty of Arts, University of Catania, after a period of careful restoration, carried out by the architect De Carlo, made it suitable for the performance of university activities and open to the public. Within the various rooms, including excel the Aula Magna, the room dedicated to the poet Mario Rapisardi and Vaccarini room of the library. This extends over two floors with wooden shelves, painted ceiling and floor in eighteenth-century Neapolitan majolica. A fascinating place, now protected by UNESCO, which allows an incredible journey through the history, the discovery of intriguing secrets.