Explore Religious Heritage Across Europe

The church of Santa Maria della Passione dates from 1486. The original plan, an octagonal lantern with eight connected chapels, may have been designed by Giovanni Antonio Amadeo but built by Giovanni Battagio. It was therefore centralised, as in many Marian sanctuaries in Renaissance Lombardy. In 1573, at the request of Carlo Borromeo, the building was transformed into a longitudinal layout, more suitable for preaching. The naves were added by Martino Bassi and the baroque façade (17th century).

The church of Santa Maria della Pietà is also known as the Church of the Dead, as it was entrusted in 1707 to the lay congregation of the same name. It is one of the largest Baroque monuments in the region. It was built in its present form at the beginning of the 18th century. The small triumphal arch that was built a few steps from the façade before 1732 was unfortunately demolished in 1839.

Santa Maria della Pomposa takes its name from the Abbey of Pomposa, one of the most important abbeys in northern Italy. The façade dates back to the Middle Ages, while the rest of the building was rebuilt in the 18th century when the parish was entrusted to the priest and famous scholar Ludovico Antonio Muratori (1672-1750), who is buried there.

The church of Santa Maria della Purità was built between 1662 and 1665 by the Bastasi brotherhood, the dockers. The façade, delimited on the sides by two pilasters and finished with a slightly protruding cornice on which rests a pediment with two lateral pinnacles, has two small windows placed in the axis of the two entrance portals. The façade is enriched with three majolica panels representing the Madonna della Purità, St. Joseph and St. Francis of Assisi.

The church of Santa Maria della Salute was built between 1950 and 1958 in the suburb of Primavalle, built in 1937 to accommodate about 7,000 to 8,000 Romans who had to leave their homes in the historic centre of the city following the demolitions ordered by the Fascist government. The construction of the parish church lasted until 1958; during the 1960s and 1970s, it was decorated with paintings, mosaics and polychrome stained glass windows, mostly donated by Canadian Catholics.

Santa Maria della Spina is a small Gothic church built in 1230 by the Gualandi family. In the 19th century, the church, while still standing on the banks of the Arno, was rebuilt on a more stable ground. Currently, the church is used to host exhibitions of contemporary art.

The church of Santa Maria della Stella, dating from 1130, is now a ruined and abandoned church. In 1221, the church was enlarged to become the mother church of the town. As the centre of the town moved further south, the construction of a new mother church dedicated to Santa Maria Assunta began in 1332 and was completed in 1402. In the 15th century, the owners of the church gave it to the Dominican fathers.

The church of Santa Maria della Stella was completed with the monastery of Santa Maria della Stella on 4 October 1585. Shortly after the construction of the complex, the small parish that housed it took the name of the Stella district. It was the fourth women's monastery built in Catanzaro.

The church of Santa Maria della Stella was built in 1571 to house an image of the Virgin previously on a hill overlooking the Sanità valley. It was rebuilt in 1587 by Domenico Fontana to larger dimensions, at the request of the Minims Fathers who owned the church and its convent. It was redesigned several times during the 17th century. Bartolomeo Picchiatti (a pupil of Fontana) began work on the marble and piperno façade, which was completed in 1734 by Domenico Antonio Vaccaro. Part of the rich interior decoration was lost forever in the fire of 1944.

Santa Maria della Verità, or Sant'Agostino degli Scalzi, is a baroque church consecrated in 1653. Augustinian monks had the church rebuilt between 1604 and 1630 by the architect Giovan Giacomo di Conforto. The church was renovated after the earthquake of 1688 by Arcangelo Guglielmelli. Lorenzo Vaccaro (1655-1706) also carried out improvements, and in the mid-18th century Giuseppe Astarita had the floor covered with marble; a further restoration took place in 1850 under the direction of Costantino Pimpinelli. The church was severely damaged by the 1980 Irpinia earthquake and was closed for decades due to structural problems. It was also the victim of church robberies at that time, with the disappearance not only of holy water basins and religious utensils, but also of precious marble inlays from one of the altars. After decades and careful restoration, the church was reopened in 2008.