The Church of Saint Mary of the Snows (Benedetto Gatti picture) was built in 1076 inside the Bonifacia fortress, so that the people could attend the holy Mass even in times of danger. It is dedicated to Saint Mary of the Snows like Basilica of Saint Mary Major in Rome.
A raised churchyard with semicircular stone steps introduces the building. The main entrance portal is in the centre of the gabled facade, now plastered, surmounted by a modern rectangular window. The right corner pillar is made of mixed masonry without plaster, as are the lateral sides of the building.
The bell tower, erected between 1786 and 1811, stands on the left side; it has a rectangular plan, with a pyramidal spire and belfry equipped with four single-lancet windows, profiled at the top by a thick molded and projecting frame. Traces of oculi in engraved stone, partially plugged in, emerge from the plaster.
The interior has a single nave completed by a triumphal arch which leads into the rectangular presbytery. On the left wall of the nave there is there is a side chapel with a pavilion vault, hosting the altar dedicated to Saint Mary of the Snows.
The Church, which became a parish church in 1578, has been renovated several times, only the choir and the presbytery have kept their original structure. Inside the Church are preserved: a stoup, datable to the 15th century, coming from the Church of Saint Martin; an 18th-century baptismal font of the Tuscan school, behind which there is a fresco of the Baptism of Christ from the early 20th century; and the eighteenth-century side altars once dedicated to Saint John the Evangelist and Saint Antony and to the souls in Purgatory and now to Pope Eugene III and the Sacred Heart.
Sitography
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