San Francesco.
Many Italians are on holiday in August. That became very clear to us when we visited the charming town of Sassoferrato. We could easily find a spot to park our car in the high part of town and then continued on foot through the historical centre without encountering many other people. Even in the Piazza Matteotti, which is normally the beating heart of Sassoferrato, everything was quiet. All this tranquillity had a downside though: many of the town’s attractions could only be visited by appointment. Fortunately the visits we desired could easily be arranged at the local tourist office, which is housed in the Palazzo Oliva on the Piazza Matteotti. The palazzo dates from the fifteenth century and was built by Alessandro Oliva (1407-1463), a cardinal who was himself from Sassoferrato. The Palazzo Oliva also accommodates an art museum, which we would visit later. First we wanted to take a tour along the churches of the town, starting with the splendid church of San Francesco.
Immediately upon our arrival in Sassoferrato we had already attempted to enter the San Francesco, but the building turned out to be closed. Fortunately the lady we met at the tourist office was able to call a volunteer to open the doors for us. The church is in fact the most beautiful that Sassoferrato has to offer.[1] Its history goes back to the thirteenth century and the San Francesco is first documented in 1248. According to a persistent local tradition, Saint Franciscus of Assisi, to whom the church is of course dedicated, founded the church himself. The same tradition holds that it was in any case built on the spot where the future saint used to pray during his stay in Sassoferrato. The light interior of the church is rather eclectic and the result of a large restoration that took place in 1989. We see the remnants of frescoes from the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, as well as paintings from the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. One of the most ancient objects in the church is a painted crucifix above the high altar. An information panel in the church attributes it to Giuliano da Rimini, a painter who was active in the first decades of the fourteenth century. I really cannot say whether this attribution is correct, but my travel guide ascribes it to the “school of Rimini”.[2]
Corso Don Giovanni Minzoni, with the church of San Francesco at the end.
Interior of the church.
The frescoes in the apse are even older: they date from the end of the thirteenth century and are attributed to an anonymous Gothic painter. A significant portion of the frescoes has been lost, but we still see a mandorla with Christ giving his blessing. The mandorla is held by two angels, while the figures inside the tondi painted on the soffit of the arch appear to be angels as well (they all have wings). In the apse we find, on the right side, the tomb of Alessandro Vincioli. He had been appointed bishop of Nocera Umbra in 1327 and was known for his good deeds when Italy was first struck by the Black Death in 1348. The benevolent bishop, who was later beatified, died around 1363 in Sassoferrato. He was granted a funerary monument in the church of San Francesco and the grateful citizens of the town issued a decree that stipulated that six pounds of wax were to be provided annually for the candles on his grave. Part of the tomb is a fresco by an unknown painter that features the bishop himself. The information sheet that I found in the church suggests that Alessandro Vincioli was rather corpulent.
On the side walls we find a number of other frescoes, many of which are in poor condition. Most appear to be fourteenth-century, although a fresco of an enthroned Madonna and Child may already be fifteenth-century. Of the more modern works, a painting of the Circumcision of Jesus by Giovanni Francesco Guerrieri (1589-1657) from Fossombrone is especially good. That Jesus was circumcised as an infant is hardly surprising. After all, the Messiah was a Jew, who had to be circumcised eight days after birth in accordance with Mosaic Law (Luke 2:21). In Guerrieri’s canvas (painted ca. 1614-1615) we see the high priest with in his left hand the genitalia of the youngster and in his right hand a knife to perform the rite. Jesus is held by a bishop, which is of course an anachronistic element. In the foreground a bath is prepared for him. All in all the painting is a remarkable work of art, and it is all the more remarkable that it has been in this church for over four hundred years.
Frescoes in the apse, end of the thirteenth century.
Remains of frescoes, fourteenth century.
Madonna and Child, fifteenth century.
Notes
[1] The next couple of paragraphs are largely based on the information sheets in the church.
[2] Bradt travel guide Umbria & the Marche (2021), p. 246.
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