The Abbey of S. Caprasio ad Aulla is known from a document of 884 A.D., in which Adalbert of Tuscany ordered the construction, at the confluence of the Magra and Aulella torrents, of a new church entrusted to monks whose subsistence he provided for with a rich donation of property.

In 2001 the first excavation was undertaken in the area outside the church, the present courtyard; in 2002 excavations concentrated on the early medieval period for which several phases were identified. In 2003-2004 the investigations moved inside the church and from 2005 excavations are underway in the courtyard situated between the church, rectory and modern nursery school, where various structures were identified relating to several phases of the ancient cloister.

At present the earliest documented building is a church built in the 8th century A.D., of which the apse was uncovered. Following the liturgical edict of 884 a larger building was constructed in which there was a ciborium, with an architrave bearing an inscription recording the foundation of the complex. In the apse of this structure, below the altar, a pit was uncovered which once held a wooden coffin containing relics that had been removed. However, the few remaining bone fragments suggest that these were the relics of S. Caprasio.

Around the year 1000 a new church with three naves was built incorporating the earlier one. In the pavement of re-used marble slabs a bilingual slab, in Greek and Latin, was found which mentions a certain L. Titinius Praefectus Fabrum. The altar was dismantled and the relics dug up and recomposed in a stucco sarcophagus. An analysis of the bones dates them to the 5th-6th century which coincides with the death of the saint to whom the sanctuary is dedicated: thus the hypothesis that these remains are those of S. Caprasio. In the same period of time (5th-6th century) a tightly packed cemetery developed around the church which remained in use until the modern period.

Numerous artefacts of great value date to before the 10th century, including presbytery enclosures, jambs, stucco work and capitals destined to decorate the cloister. It should also be noted that several coins attest the Abbey’s importance between the 10th-14th century in relation to the movement of pilgrims and goods along the Magra Valley.