|
Cossato (Biella)- Church of San Pietro
|
|
|
Show to visit in the Biella area: |
 The small church of San Pietro in Castellengo is an authentic jewel of art and history, although located in the countryside surrounding a small town in the Biella area, Castellengo fraction of Cossato.
The church is a few hundred meters from the river Cervo. It is an isolated building, between the woods, the MOORLAND that is in front of IT and the fields behind. Next to it there is the small cemetery of Castellengo.
Very old, the original part, corresponding to the central nave, was built around the ninth century in Romanesque style. Note the columns without capitals. It was equipped with a circular apse, typical of that epoque.
During the fifteenth century the aisles were added, first the right one, decorated with beautiful late Gothic frescoes of the workshop of Daniele de Bosis, and later the left one.
Towards the middle of the eighteenth century the works to replace the original church with a larger Baroque one were started.
Fortunately the arrival of Napoleon led to the interruption of the work, not before, however, that the original apse was demolished to make way to the back of the new church. This structure, then enlarged at the end of the seventeenth century to make way for the precious organ (still present but currently not working), now dominates on the rest of the church as a foreign body out of all proportion to the rest.
The church possesses also a belltower, placed in front of the facade and contemporary with the central nave, and the seventeenth-century portico beside it.
On the left side of the facade there was originally a fresco of St. Christopher, unfortunately badly removed and stolen few decades ago.
In the past also other later buildings were built around the church, buildings later demolished.
In the late nineties, the church was in a state of serious neglect. Fortunately various restoration projects have allowed to bring it back, at least in large part, to its original splendor.
In fact the frescoes that have been recovered are striking for the beauty of the colors and the emotional entanglements that they are capable of transmitting. Created to illustrate biblical stories to the illiterate population of those times, they tell now today's visitors a lot about the daily life of the epoque in which they were painted.
Further pictures of the Church of San Pietro in Castellengo
Categories: Places of historical value of artistic value
Strada Comunale Montalciata Cossato, 13836 Cossato BI (Italia) |
Church of San Pietro: Further pictures in the section Photography |