Santa Maria Altofonte Monastery
| Cistercian Abbey of Santa Maria Altofonte | |
|---|---|
 Church facade |
|
| location |
 ItalyRegion of Sicily Metropolitan City of Palermo |
| Coordinates: | 38 ° 2 '42.2 " N , 13 ° 17' 55.5" E |
| Serial number according to Janauschek |
698 |
| Patronage | St. Mary |
| founding year | 1307 |
| Year of dissolution / annulment |
1766 |
| Mother monastery | Santes Creus Monastery |
| Primary Abbey | Clairvaux Monastery |
|
Daughter monasteries |
no |
Santa Maria Altofonte Monastery was a Cistercian abbey in Sicily , Italy . The monastery, named after a nearby spring, was located around 10 km south of Palermo in the metropolitan city of the same name in the current municipality of Altofonte on the slopes of the Moarda at 350 m above sea level.
history
After the House of Anjou had renounced Sicily in the Peace of Caltabellotta in 1302 in favor of the House of Aragon , Frederick III decided. to found a Cistercian monastery on the island. As a place he chose the Parco Nuovo, where there was already a palace built by King Roger II , which was called Palazzo Reale or Palazzo del Parco.
In 1307 the abbey was established under Abbot Gualtiero de Manna from the Santo Spirito convent in Palermo. The monastery also received the Partinico forest. The founding convention came from the Santes Creus monastery in today's Catalonia , where the ancestors of Frederick III. were buried. As a subsidiary of Santes Creus, the abbey belonged to the filiation of the Clairvaux Primary Abbey . The abbot of the rapidly blossoming abbey became a baron of the kingdom and received a seat in parliament. The village of Parco was formed around the monastery and changed its name to Altofonte in 1930. In 1435 the abbey fell in the coming period . Commendation abbots were u. a. Ascanio Colonna , Scipione Caffarelli Borghese , who had the church rebuilt in 1633, and Francesco Maria de 'Medici . In 1766 the monastery was dissolved and the few remaining monks moved to the monastery of Santa Maria di Roccamadore near Messina . The monastery church became a parish church and the remaining monastery buildings are used for church purposes.
Plant and buildings
It is unclear whether the church, which was listed from 1618 to 1633, was a baroque hall church, replacing an earlier one, or whether the monks had been using the small single-aisled chapel of St. Archangel Michael belonging to the palace of Roger II.
gallery
Entrance to the former monastery
Chapel of the Norman Palace
Former Monastery church, interior
literature
- Balduino Gustavo Bedini: Breve prospetto delle Abazie Cistercensi d'Italia. Dalla fondazione di Citeaux (1098) alla metà del secolo decimoquarto. sn, sl 1964, pp. 174-175.
- Teresa Torregrossa: La Chiesa di Santo Spirito a Palermo (= Saggi di storia dell'architettura antica e medievale. 1). Alinea editrice, Florence 2000, ISBN 88-8125-339-9 , pp. 69-70.