Sanctuary of Madonna di Reggio (building)

**The Sanctuary of Madonna di Reggio** is a Catholic place located in the locality of the same name in the municipality of Vernazza, the sanctuary is located in a natural square 315 meters above sea level, surrounded by holm oaks, cedars, horse chestnuts and an ancient centuries-old cypress, the building was built in Roman times modified from the Middle Ages onwards.

## **Description**

The Sanctuary dedicated to Nostra Signora di Reggio rises on the hill at 315 meters in the center of a shady square, surrounded behind and flanks by the Apennines, and open to the east on the sea. The mule track that leads from the village, about two kilometers long, is paved with stones and pebbles, steep in some places, restful in others, among olive groves and vineyards.

The masonry of the wall towards the mountain of the sanctuary, could be datable between the ninth and tenth centuries and the bell tower datable to the turn of the year 1000. The residual walls indicate that the oldest building was oriented on the North-South axis, like the current one, this identifies that the original apse must have been arranged to the South, towards the light, and the entrance to the North, positioned in reverse than today's. The inversion of the orientation was already achieved in the restructuring of the fourteenth century, when the facade in freestone was rebuilt, and the wall towards the valley recovering the materials of the early medieval wall.

## **History**

### **Medieval age**

Dating back to Roman times, in a period dating back to the 1st century BC, it was an important medieval crossroads, the area was probably a pagan cemetery area, perhaps from the 5th century. The church, certainly built before the 11th century on the remains of an ancient place of prayer, of which the remains remain in the crypt, is documented for the first time, with the title of: "Santa Maria", in 1248. In the Bonifacian tithes of 1303 the church appears cited as "chapel of Rigio de Vernacia" and counted among the entities directly dependent on the bishop of Luni. The simple original Romanesque facade, in stone, is of the gabled type, surmounted by Baroque decorations. The portal is surmounted by a lunette bearing a marble bas-relief dedicated to the Virgin and Child. The interior was originally a basilica.

Another interesting documentary evidence of the antiquity of the place is given by some tombs, one of which is still visible in the rocky escarpment that delimits the square towards the north. This tomb, now full of dirt and debris, consists of a tomb the length of a human body, covered by a black stone that shows at the top another stone, smaller, in the shape of a shield, on which the Cross is engraved. of the Knights of Pisa in all similar to that of Malta. To the side, on the left side, that is, on the side where the head rested, there is a low round column, at the height of a kneeling man, with a square-shaped capital, in the style of Rovigo. It was the so-called: "column of tears", on which those who went there in prayer leaned with their face bent in their arms bent high up on the elbows: and the oral tradition handed down from father to son, wants that he was buried there a knight of the noble Malaspina family, who died in battle during the Crusade and was transported there for devotion, or fighting in these places in defense of the Republic of Pisa against the Saracens or the rival Genoa.

Other similar tombs came to light during the extension works of the square, carried out in 1823 and 1843, to a more remarkable depth from the current level. It is therefore easy to deduce that there must have been a more remote Etruscan or Roman or Paleochristian Necropolis on site, whose tombs were reused in a later period, that is between the 12th and 13th centuries, as can be seen from some sepulchral inscriptions found nearby. of the Apse, with the dates of 1200 and 1311, and from the observation that the shield stone with the Cross of the Knights of Pisa appears superimposed on the slab that encloses the tomb. Probably therefore, and at the same time of the erection of the Church, the Sacred Image painted in Byzantine style must be referred to, as was common at the time, which was influenced by the new artistic canons brought by the monks and by the populations who fled to the persecutions of emperor Leo III the Isaurian.

### **Modern age**

In 1584, Monsignor Angelo Peruzzi described the church of Reggio in poor condition and in need of restorations on the roof, including the cemetery which at the time was in need of interventions. In 1600, Monsignor Salvago downgraded it to a simple oratorium campestrem. Fifteen years later in another pastoral visit, the hiconam placed on the high altar is mentioned for the first time, containing an image of the Blessed Virgin, specifying that the people of Vernazza flock to honor her.

Officially declared miraculous since 4 October 1642, as evidenced by a letter from the then Bishop of Sarzana and other miracles were decreed in 1767 and 1771 by the Vicar of the Diocese, Monsignor Staffetta the Thaumaturgical Effigy to which the vows and prayers of these populations who honored with their faith also the "niche" hollowed out in the wall next to the bell tower, and through which the invoked protectress granted her grace several times, was solemnly crowned on 7 August 1853, as per decree of Pope Pius IX, who also granted the authorization to celebrate the Mass of the Nativity of the Virgin on the first Sunday of August.

The gold crowns were offered by the local priest Giuseppe Emanuele Castrucci, who returned to his homeland after sixteen years of mission in the Amazon River area and in Peru, and the solemn ceremony was celebrated by the Bishop of Genoa, Monsignor Andrea Charvaz, arrived in Vernazza with a specially chartered ship. Great was that day the enthusiasm and the help of the population who in just forty-five days provided to carry out other and more important works, including a new road and the arrangement of the centuries-old square, and contributed to the expenses with a public subscription, opened with a offer of Queen Maria Teresa widow of Carlo Alberto. And every year, on the first Sunday of August, the spectacle of the crowds that go up on pilgrimage to invoke peace and protection from the Venerated Image is renewed in this Sanctuary.

### **Contemporary age**

In 1850 it was renovated with three naves and a Latin cross plan. The interior decoration, which still shows the ancient capitals, is mainly Baroque. In addition to numerous ex voto, the church preserves the painting of the so-called Black Madonna with the Child Jesus. The image of the Madonna was once believed to be of Byzantine origin; Recent and in-depth studies have ascertained that the painting is from the Tuscan school of the fourteenth century. For the numerous documented miraculous healings, since 1615 the veneration of the image of the Virgin is attested. The sick who came to the sanctuary to request pardon attended the sacred functions from a recess in the right aisle called a "window".

The guesthouse, built during the nineteenth century and home to a convent of nuns, still offers a refreshment point with the possibility of staying. The cult of the Virgin probably developed at the beginning of the seventeenth century, grew in intensity in the following century and was finally made official by the Coronation of 1853. In 1771 the effigy was declared miraculous by Monsignor Staffetta, vicar general of the bishop of Sarzana, and subsequently the complex religious becomes a sanctuary. In 1769 the rectory was rebuilt and in 1823 the pilgrim was annexed as it is seen today.

## **Toponym**

The toponym Reggio has an uncertain etymology. In 1318 the dialectal form Reza appears, meaning "rete". Regghia / reglia in ancient Tuscan means "fosso", "rigagno-" rivagnolo "as a canal still denotes an artificial canal today: it is therefore likely that Reggio is actually a hydronym, born in relation to the spring that flows near the sanctuary. church has undergone several interventions over time, including the insertion of the transept and the alteration of the facade.

## **Legends**

* The image of the Virgin, which legend has it completed by St. Luke, is a painting on canvas applied to wood. Recently restored, it is a product of the Genoese school of the fourteenth century.

## **Trivia**

* Probably in ancient times, the villages of Vernazza and Pignone formed a single center and this would be confirmed by a remote popular song that begins as follows: "And when the people of Reggio divided", subsequently there was the descent to the sea by the inhabitants to erect the new inhabited area, where part of the inhabited area moved to the fertile plains of Pignone. The Church of the ancient matrix remained in the territory of Vernazza, becoming the seat of the Sanctuary and which is also said to take its name from the locality.

## **Bibliography**

* Castelli medioevali della Lunigiana occidentale in “Giornale Storico della Lunigiana”, a cura di Maria Luisa Scarin, Istituto Internazionale Studi Liguri-Bordighera, 1962.
* Cento conventi-contributi alla storia della provincia francescana ligure, a cura di Frate Alfonso Casini, Genova, Convento della Visitazione, 1950.
* Le Cinque Terre e Portovenere, a cura di Cesare Ferrari, Arte della Stampa - La Spezia, 1952.
* Documenti sulla riviera lunigianese nel Basso Medioevo, a cura di Leopoldo Cimaschi, Giornale Storico della Lunigiana, 1956.
* Storia e parlata di Vernazza, a cura di Irene Di Martino, CENTROSTAMPA, Arcola (SP), 2014.
* Vernazza le trasformazioni nel tempo dell’insediamento e del territorio, a cura di Renata Allegri e Osvaldo Garbarino, LIBRERIA GEOGRAFICA, 2018.
* Vernazza nell’Ottocento, a cura di Giuseppe Rollando, Edizione Parco Nazionale delle Cinque Terre, 2003.
* Vini e vigneti delle Cinque Terre, a cura di Paolo Emilio Faggioni, negli scritti di G. Targioni Tozzetti, G. Guidoni, G. Gallesio, L. Beretta, G. Sforza, STRINGA EDITORE, Genova, 1983.
* Dizionario del dialetto di Vernazza, a cura Francesco Di Martino e Per Giorgio Cavallini, La Tipografia, Levanto, 2021.
* Le poesie di Tofa, a cura di Tofa, Edizione Parco Nazionale delle Cinque Terre, Tipografia Ambrosiana Litografia, 2006.
* Le Cinque Terre: Genesi degli insediamenti, a cura di Giovanni Rolla, Tesi di Laurea in Storia degli Insediamenti Tardo-Antichi e Medioevali.
* Storie e leggende delle Cinque Terre e di Levanto, a cura di Aldo Viviani e Francesco Musante, Edizioni Giacché, 1998.
* Vernazza Amarcord, a cura di Elena Bertozzi.
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* I castelli della Liguria, a cura di Pia Spagiari, Stringa Editore, Genova, 1973.
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* I canti da Maemuna, a cura di Cristoforo Basso, Giuliano Carro e Andrea Leonardini, Edizione Parco Nazionale delle Cinque Terre.

## **External links**

* Comune di Vernazza website
* Vernazza 5 Terre website
* Parco Nazionale delle 5 Terre website
* Save Vernazza website

## References

this page was lastly reviewd on 12-08-20221. ↑ https://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Santuario\_di\_Nostra\_Signora\_di\_Reggio
2. ↑ http://www.parconazionale5terre.it/pun\_dettaglio.php?id\_pun=1940