The church of Sant'Angelo in Grotta is a small rock settlement in Nocera Inferiore, privately owned, at the end of via Ovidio Forino, in the area known in dialect as «Ngopp Sant'Angelo», at the mouth of a large cave that opens into Monte Albino. Sant'Angelo and its cave are recorded as early as 1023; the priory was founded between 1080 and 1086 by Saint Peter Pappacarbone, third abbot of the Badia of Cava, and was at first a hospice of the monastery of the Trinity.
What to see
Prince Jordan of Capua and his wife Gaitelgrima gave the monastery of the Trinity the vassals of the nearby village, over whom the prior of Sant'Angelo also held civil jurisdiction for centuries. In 1507 cave and monastery sheltered the monks of Cava during a popular uprising that threatened the abbey. Sant'Angelo was the mother church of Nocera until 1592, when the title passed to San Matteo. At the end of the nineteenth century the complex belonged to the Giannelli family, and a few years later passed by marriage to the Maranca family from Abruzzo, who made it their home.
The little church is almost square in plan, with two small vaulted side aisles and a central dome before the altar, carried on four columns with round arches; the drum is frescoed with the dove of the Holy Spirit. The present portal, in the grey tuff of Nocera, is cut from a pointed arch and bears the Carafa arms. In the garden beside it, screened by vegetation, is the cave that gives the complex its name.
Visiting
The complex is private: since 2011 the building has housed a restaurant, opened after work designed to preserve the artworks. Visiting options should be checked beforehand.
Our editors' tip
On the right-hand wall stood the tombstone of Giovanni de Haya, chamberlain of King Robert of Anjou and brother of Filippo de Haya, abbot of Cava from 1316 to 1331.
