Themed thread
The bishops who consecrated on tour
Four bishops, four years, and some twenty churches blessed around the valleys.
Reading the entries one after another you notice something no book lines up: certain auxiliary bishops did not consecrate one church, they consecrated ten, and often in the same year. These were pastoral tours, and in village records they left a date that for many churches is the first certain information we have.
The clearest case is Mariano Manno, and the year is 1558: he consecrates at Ossana, Tassullo, Sarnonico, Seio, Segno, Vervò, Cogolo and in the church that serves Lanza and Mocenigo. Before him Francesco De la Chiesa had done the same between 1497 and 1500, with dates that can still be read: 14 October 1497 at Dimaro, 23 February 1500 at Dardine, 14 October 1500 at Celentino, and then Cusiano, Cogolo, Cloz, Peio and Vervò.
The seventeenth century has its own: Jesse Perchoffer, auxiliary bishop of Bressanone, who in 1649 alone consecrates at Caldes, Carnalez, Vervò, Vermiglio and, on 22 August, the church of the Franciscan friary at Cles. The last in the series is Francesco Saverio Luschin, who in 1825 consecrates at Terzolas, Romeno and Samoclevo, and later at Portolo. Four names, four years, and some twenty villages that marked that day in the register.
24 places where you meet it
- Chiesa dei Santi Fabiano e SebastianoVal di SoleAlso known as the church of the Madonna delle Grazie, it is mentioned in documents as early as the first years of the 13th century, but news of major works of enlargement and rebuilding only appears four centuries later.
- Chiesa dei Santi Filippo e GiacomoValle di PejoThe first documentary mention of the church of Cogolo dates from 1281, and about fifty years later, in 1322, that original church was rebuilt: this is recorded by the epigraph on the north side.
- Chiesa dei Santi Pietro e PaoloVal di NonParish church of Casez, a hamlet of Sanzeno. It was built starting from 1200 and completed within the first half of the century; the first written mentions date from 1264.
- Chiesa della Beata Maria VergineVal di NonThere are no reliable sources, but it is thought that a first chapel dedicated to the Virgin Mary was built in Sarnonico in the twelfth century.
- Chiesa della Madonna del RosarioVal di NonThe parish church of Vervò is mentioned as early as the first half of the fourteenth century, and in the following century it received the Eucharistic tabernacle and the baptismal font.
- Chiesa della Natività di MariaVal di NonOn the site there are remains of an older church, but the certain facts concern the fourteenth-century building and come from a notarial document.
- Chiesa di San Giacomo MaggioreVal di SoleThis church matters more than others to its village, because it gave the village its name: the hamlet was anciently called Solasna, and only later took the name of the saint to whom the church is dedicated.
- Chiesa di San GiorgioVal di NonThe church of Seio was built in its first form probably in the fourteenth century, or perhaps in the previous century, given that it was almost certainly rebuilt around 1390.
- Chiesa di San MarcelloVal di NonThe first place of worship at Dardine seems to date back to the 13th century.
- Chiesa di San MartinoVal di NonThe cemetery church of Vervò was built in the 14th century, and during that period it was for two years the seat of the Compagnia dei Battuti.
- Chiesa di San MartinoVal di NonDevotion to San Martino is very old, and the dedication has suggested that the church was built earlier; the first mention, however, is found only in 1537, in the records of a pastoral visit by the cardinal and prince-bishop of Trento Bernardo Clesio.
- Chiesa di San NicolòVal di SoleThe place of worship of Terzolas is first mentioned at the beginning of the thirteenth century in the Codex Vangianus, the collection that the prince-bishop of Trento Federico Vanga had compiled from 1215; a second written record dates from 1312.
- Chiesa di San RoccoValle di PejoBefore the church, this site was home to a Celtic-Rhaetian fortress: excavations and research have uncovered weapons and household items that confirm it.
- Chiesa di San TommasoVal di NonThe first place of worship dedicated to San Tommaso in Portolo may date from a period between the thirteenth and fifteenth centuries.
- Chiesa di San VigilioVal di NonAround the 14th century a small chapel stood on the site, and in the following century the new church had already been built.
- Chiesa di San VigilioVal di SoleThe place of worship of Samoclevo is first mentioned in 1374, and then again more than a century later, in 1481 and 1497.
- Chiesa di San VigilioVal di SoleThe pieve of Ossana is first documented in 1183 and is among the oldest in the upper Val di Sole: the documents call it erecta ab immemorabili, built from time immemorial.
- Chiesa di Sant'AgostinoValle di PejoThe first chapel of Celentino is mentioned as early as 1301. Around the fifteenth century it was rebuilt from scratch and enlarged, and the new church, dedicated to the Madonna, was solemnly consecrated on 14 October 1500 by the suffragan bishop of Trento Francesco De la Chiesa. In 1580 it became a curacy of the pieve of Ossana, that is, of the church of San Vigilio, and obtained the baptismal font.
- Chiesa di Sant'EmerenzianaVal di NonA Romanesque building of the 11th or 12th century, on an offshoot of monte Corno at the mouth of the Val di Tovel.
- Chiesa di Santa Maria AssuntaVal di NonThat a chapel dedicated to the Assunta already existed in Romeno in the twelfth century is probable but not certain: the first documentary mention, a generic one, dates from the early thirteenth century, and an explicit reference appears only in the following century.
- Chiesa di Santa Maria AssuntaVal di NonThe first official mention is said to refer to the consecration of the high altar, which took place in 1101.
- Chiesa di Santa Maria AssuntaVal di NonCloz is made up of two neighbouring centres that form a single settlement, and which are sometimes distinguished by the names of their respective churches, Santo Stefano and Santa Maria.
- Chiesa di Santa Maria MaddalenaVal di SoleThe presence of a place of worship at Cusiano is documented as early as 1368, and from 1470 it is known that Giovanni and Battista, of the important Baschenis workshop originally from the Valle Averara, worked on its decoration.
- Convento di Sant'AntonioVal di NonIn 1628 the Tyrolean Franciscans asked for permission to build a convent in Cles.
The links between these places come from our entries, where every fact has been checked against the sources. The entries are written one at a time: this thread will grow with them.