Rivalta Scrivia Monastery
| Rivalta Scrivia Cistercian Abbey | |
|---|---|
 The church facade |
|
| location |
 Italyregion Piedmont province Alessandria |
| Coordinates: | 44 ° 51 '17.9 " N , 8 ° 49' 35" E |
| Patronage | St. Mary |
| founding year | 1181 |
| Year of dissolution / annulment |
before 1583 |
| Mother monastery | Lucedio Monastery |
| Primary Abbey | La Ferté Monastery |
|
Daughter monasteries |
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Rivalta Scrivia Monastery (S. Maria di Rivalta Scrivia) is a former Cistercian abbey and later a Benedictine monastery in Piedmont , Italy . It is located in the municipality of Tortona in the province of Alessandria in Piedmont, around 7.5 km south of the city of Tortona and at a short distance from the Milan - Genoa motorway.
history
In 1150, Guglielmo da Sala founded a church of St. John on the left bank of the Scrivia river, which was soon joined by a clerical settlement dependent on the canons in Tortona. The monastery, which was under the direction of Abbot Ascherio, joined the Cistercian Order in 1181, and it was affiliated to the Lucedio Monastery, founded in 1124 from the filiation of the Primary Abbey of La Ferté . Soon afterwards the construction of the new abbey building began. The abbey was named S. Maria di Rivalta Scrivia or Tortonese. She had two daughters: Acqualonga Monastery (1204) and Preallo Monastery (1237). The abbey developed rapidly. In the 15th century, she fell into the coming and did not join the Italian Cistercian congregation founded in 1497. In 1583, Benedictines took the place of the Cistercians. The abbey was dissolved in 1776 and the church became a parish church.
Plant and buildings
The monastery church, built around 1181 to 1223 and restored in 1943/1944, a cruciform Romanesque brick basilica with transept, rectangular choir and two vaulted chapels on the east side of the transept arms of the Fontenay type, with originally four roughly square nave double yokes in the bound system ( the western double yoke broken off around 1683). The nave follows Lombard Cistercian Romanesque architecture (Reclam's art guide). The choir has a pointed barrel; the east side has a round window over two arched windows. At the north transept there is a spiral staircase to the roof. The west facade has a baroque gable portal. The church is adorned with numerous wall paintings from the transition from the late Gothic to the Renaissance.
Of the convent buildings that adjoin the church to the south (right), the east wing with sacristy, chapter house and dormitory above is well preserved. The square chapter house is divided into nine bays with rib vaults by four slender columns and opens onto the former cloister, of which only the east wing has been partially preserved; the sacristy has two bays with rib vaults. The dormitory staircase in the south transept has been preserved. The southern refectory wing is gone. A large Renaissance cloister is attached to the converted Konversenbau.
literature
- Heinz Schomann, Reclams Art Guide Italy Volume I, 2 , Philipp Reclam jun., Stuttgart 1982, p. 412 ff., ISBN 3-15-010305-3 , with floor plan;
- Balduino Gustavo Bedini, Le abazie cistercensi d'Italia , oO. (Casamari), 1964, p. 78 f., Without ISBN, with further references;
- Miotti F., Denegri P., L'Abbazia cistercense di Santa Maria di Rivalta Scrivia , Tortona, 2006.