Behind an austere façade, San Domenico — the Dominicans' mother church in Modica, also known as Santa Maria del Rosario — hides more than one surprise. Founded in 1461 with its adjoining convent, the church was brought down by the 1613 earthquake and rebuilt in 1678, then withstood the far worse quake of 1693. The convent beside it was for centuries the seat of the Inquisition Tribunal, and since 1869 it has housed the town hall.
What to see
The façade tells of two eras: the first order bears the date 1678, the second is eighteenth-century. Four niches hold the stone statues of the great Dominicans — Saint Dominic de Guzmán with the little dog carrying a torch, Saint Peter of Verona, Saint Thomas Aquinas and Saint Vincent Ferrer — while a large coat of arms of the order crowns the doorway. Inside, a single nave under a barrel vault, the Baroque stuccos are the work of Giuseppe Gianforma; the main altar, in rococo marble, is by the Catania sculptor Privitera and holds the group of the Blessed Virgin of the Rosary. Among the canvases stands out the Apparition of Saint Dominic by Matteo Reati, around 1640.
Visiting
The real discovery is beneath your feet: from the entrance hall you go down into a crypt found in 1972 by the Modica historian Giovanni Modica Scala, with twenty-two niches that held the friars' burials and rooms decorated with skulls and symbols. An adjoining space served as an ossuary.
Our editors' tip
Don't stop at the church: ask to see the crypt, the most surprising and least-known part of the complex. And remember you are also entering Modica's town hall — few places in the world have their council seat inside a fifteenth-century Dominican convent.