At Fumeri they rebuilt the bell tower first and the church afterwards. The tower was rebuilt in 1728; the first stone of the new church was blessed only in 1741. It is the order of priority of a community that cannot afford everything at once: the bells served everybody every day, as clock and as alarm, and they came before the rest.
What to see
The older church is named in a document of 1222 and by the early eighteenth century was in a ruinous state, so much so that a new one was required. The works lasted exactly ten years, slowed also by the War of the Austrian Succession, which in the middle of the century reached the territories of the Republic of Genoa.
In the nineteenth century the interior was altered several times: the marble high altar was remade twice in the course of the century, and the works closed only at its end. The consecration came well into the twentieth century, at the hands of the cardinal archbishop of Genoa.
Visiting
The church is in via Fiume, in the hamlet of Fumeri, municipality of Mignanego, on the road climbing from the val Polcevera towards the Giovi; it is a parish church and opens for services. Twenty minutes.
Our editors' tip
Look at the valley and remember that it is a corridor. Through here runs the historic way between Genoa and the Po plain, the Giovi pass, and for centuries goods, pilgrims and armies have passed along it. When you read that a village building site stopped because of a distant war, the explanation is always this: the war was not distant, it came through here.