Abbey of Santa Maria delle Macchie, San Ginesio

The Abbazia di Santa Maria delle Macchie (Santa Maria Macularum) was a former Roman Catholic Benedictine monastery located in a rural hamlet of Macchie, a few kilometers from the town of San Ginesio, in the province of Macerata, region of Marche, Italy.

History

It is unclear when the Benedictine abbey at this site was founded. The abundant use of spolia from a nearby Roman town of Urbs Salvia, suggest a founding as early as the 8th to 9th centuries, but construction techniques in the 12th-century crypt suggest founding after the 10th century. Uncertain documentation may point to this abbey by 1171, while the first confirmed documentation is by the 13th century. By the 16th century the abbey's reach was limited, yet the abbey persisted as a Benedictine institution such as late as 1848.

In 1658, Cardinal Giovanni Battista Pallotta promoted restoration of the entire complex: church and monastery. The well-preserved Romanesque-style crypt retains some of the few original elements. The 17th-century Baroque brick facade has a curved pediment roofline, and the facade has eliminated a prior rose window, replaced with four awkward rectangular windows. The original round arch terracotta portal had some spolia fragments of marble friezes and volutes. The church layout now has a single nave. The presbytery is elevated to accommodate the crypt, and the apse has two large chapels.^[1]

The crypt is the jewel of the site, with seven naves densely populated by columns and pilasters. The columns have some romanesque capitals with decorative plant and animal motifs, others are ancient Roman ionic capitals and marble shaft columns.^[2]

The adjacent buildings may remants of the adjacent monastery.

References