The church of Santa Maria in Castello, also known as the Sagra, is the oldest church in Carpi: according to tradition it was founded by the Lombard king Aistulf in 752, but documentation exists from the ninth century. It faces piazzale Re Astolfo and is a Romanesque pieve consecrated in 1184.
What to see
The present layout dates from the twelfth century, under the patronage of Matilda of Canossa, on an earlier Lombard foundation. The nave was profoundly altered in the Renaissance: some bays were pulled down, shortening the building, and a barrel vault was added, removed between 1886 and 1887 by the engineer Achille Sammarini; from the medieval period mainly the apse remains. The Renaissance façade, designed by Baldassarre Peruzzi and built in 1515, is an innovative experiment in which, perhaps on a Bramantesque scheme later popularised by Palladio, two architraved orders of different height are superimposed on the same plane. The central portal, moved from one of the old side entrances, has a bas-relief lunette with a Crucifixion, probably of the Antelami school, strongly realistic; the sides of the church are decorated with arcades on half-columns influenced by Modena cathedral, with capitals showing eagles and fantastic animals. The bell tower, almost fifty metres high, is notable.
The interior houses a cycle of Romanesque frescoes of the twelfth century, quite rare in Emilia, found after the demolition of Peruzzi's vault: fragmentary, they show scenes from the life of Christ and other New Testament episodes, among them the Incredulity of Saint Thomas, the Ascension, the Massacre of the Innocents, the Flight into Egypt and the Supper at Emmaus. Almost contemporary is the fresco of the Adoration of the Magi at the centre of the central apse, degraded but restored in 1932 and 1951. Frescoes of the early fifteenth century in Emilia are in the chapel of San Martino, with the four Evangelists on the vault and the four Doctors of the Latin Church on the walls, and in that of Santa Caterina, built at the end of the fourteenth century and almost entirely frescoed by an anonymous master called the Master of the Sagra di Carpi. Also preserved are a marble sarcophagus of 1351, by Sibellino da Caprara, with the remains of Manfredo I Pio, lord of Carpi, and a Romanesque pulpit with the symbols of the four evangelists.
Visiting
The church is on piazzale Re Astolfo, in Carpi, in the medieval heart of the city. The sources consulted give no opening hours or visiting arrangements: check with the parish.
Our editors' tip
In the portal lunette, on either side of Jesus on the cross, are the two centurions, the one with the lance (Longinus) and the one with the sponge and the bottle of vinegar, with the Virgin on the left and Saint John on the right; at the ends are two small figures, perhaps representing the people.
