What to see · Osimo

More places of interest

• Cattedrale di San Leopardo

  The co-cathedral of San Leopardo, which in Osimo is called «'l Domo», is the main church of the town and stands on its highest hill, the Gòmero. It is a Romanesque-Gothic building of white stone, dedicated to the first bishop of Osimo, who lived in the fifth century. The enlargement ordered by Bishop Gentile between the end of the twelfth and the beginning of the thirteenth century is documented: the church went from one to three aisles and was given its presbytery, crypt, apse and porch. At the end of the thirteenth century Bishop Giovanni Uguccione introduced Gothic elements. In 1589 Bishop Teodosio Fiorenzi reversed its orientation: that is why the high altar is today at the west end. Since 1940 it has been a national monument, and since 1955 a minor basilica.

  What to see

  Under the three-arched portico are two portals. The one on the left has three arches: in the middle one six saints and angels turn towards the Lamb, at the centre, and at the base of the columns are two lions. In the one on the right two long serpents, their tails entwined, bite a porphyry apple, symbol of original sin; at the sides are the bas-reliefs of King Solomon and of King David with the censer. At the centre of the transept end opens the rose window, surrounded by a ring of human heads and animals, among them lions, eagles and goats.

  The interior is a Latin cross, with a nave and two aisles. On the walls hang four large canvases by Gian Domenico Lombardi, from the beginning of the eighteenth century, with the holy bishops Benvenuto, Leopardo, Vitaliano and Silvestro: in that of St Leopardus an angel holds a tray with the model of the town. A stairway goes down to the crypt.

  Visiting

  Today's main entrance is reached from the inner courtyard, passing through the entrance hall to the right of the façade. Opening times and the times of services should be checked before going up.

  Our editors' tip

  In the chapel of the Crucifix is a thirteenth-century wooden Christ, in a regal attitude. According to local tradition, supported by a hundred and twenty written testimonies, on 2 July 1796 it opened its eyes and moved its lips. And on the right-hand portal look at the vase in Solomon's hand: according to legend it held, sealed inside, the demons who helped him to govern and to build the temple.

• Chiesa di San Sabino

  The church of San Sabino is the parish church of the hamlet of the same name in Osimo, about three kilometres east of the historic centre, along the provincial road that leads to Castelfidardo. The hamlet was born around the year one thousand, perhaps even earlier; the building of the first church goes back to 1037, but the parish was declared only in 1723, and in June 2023 its three hundred years were celebrated. From its origins it has been consecrated to St Sabinus of Spoleto, a bishop martyred under Diocletian and Maximian for refusing to worship Jupiter.

  What to see

  Today's church was erected in 1939 to a design by the engineer Benedetto Barbalarga, in place of the old one, which had been devastated by the effects of the Great War and stood in a position considered unsafe because of the traffic: for this reason it was rebuilt many metres further back from the edge of the road. It stands at the centre of the hamlet, on a wide open space. The façade has a large rose window, in a frame that alternates parts in brick and in white stone; the portal is surrounded by a brick porch, on two sturdy marble columns, and in the lunette is a fresco of the Madonna.

  The interior has a single nave, ending in a semicircular apse. Behind the altar, raised by two steps, is the niche with the statue of St Sabinus, between two small columns of dark marble; the two side chapels have the niches of the Sacred Heart of Jesus and of the Madonna.

  Visiting

  Opening and Mass times should be checked with the parish. The church was also damaged in the Second World War, then restored; it was consecrated on 21 August 1954, a Marian year.

  Our editors' tip

  Raise your eyes to the walls: they are decorated in a style that recalls the Byzantine, in tones of gold and blue, and all along the nave they carry in Latin the words of the most classic Christian prayers. The date of the consecration, instead, is written in Roman numerals under the Madonna in the lunette.

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