Santa Maria la Nova Church, Scicli, Italy

Santa Maria La Nova is a Baroque-style church in Scicli. A church at the site, dedicated to Santa Maria della Pietà, was present by the 6th-7th centuries. This church was destroyed during the Norman conquest. Reconstruction under the sponsorship of the Confraternity of the same name was funded by Pietro Di Lorenzo Busacca that, doing the will in 1567. The rebuilt church was then destroyed by the 1693 earthquake.

Like most other churches in town, it has a facade with three orders, divided into three compartments by pilasters, two Ionic and one Corinthian. The third story links to a belltower with a stone balustrade. The original designer was Giovanni Venancio Marvuglia, but his work was carried out by Cardona, with the interior stucco decoration completed in 1801 by Emanuele and Domenico Ruiz. The nave is flanked by three chapels on each side with a dome at the crossing. The upper story and vaults of the nave were begun in 1817 and the stuccoes not completed until 1851 by Gianforma. The church was reconsecrated in 1857.

References:

Wikipedia

Religious sites in Italy

User Reviews

Giovanni Burletti (8 months ago)
Beautiful but in a state of decay

Paolo Oddo (10 months ago)
Church dating back to a first construction of the fifteenth century, it owes its name to the mainly funerary use that was made of it. In fact, thirty crypts were found during the renovation of the floor, not yet completed. Inside it is possible to admire the simulacra of "Cristo alla Colonna", "Cristo alla Croce", Madonna dello Spasimo ". Inside the rectory a museum has been set up with the restoration laboratory and where it is possible to see one of the six natural mummies found during the works. The church can be visited every day because it is kept open by the "Museo del Campanile - Triskele" group.

Sergio T (12 months ago)
Closed

Padua Wolfango (13 months ago)
The church is Baroque in style and is architecturally simple but very spiritual.

Manuela Ben (13 months ago)
Great potential, it needs huge restorations. Too bad for dirt and neglect.

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Broch of Gurness

The Broch of Gurness is an Iron Age broch village. Settlement here began sometime between 500 and 200 BC. At the centre of the settlement is a stone tower or broch, which once probably reached a height of around 10 metres. Its interior is divided into sections by upright slabs. The tower features two skins of drystone walls, with stone-floored galleries in between. These are accessed by steps. Stone ledges suggest that there was once an upper storey with a timber floor. The roof would have been thatched, surrounded by a wall walk linked by stairs to the ground floor. The broch features two hearths and a subterranean stone cistern with steps leading down into it. It is thought to have some religious significance, relating to an Iron Age cult of the underground.

The remains of the central tower are up to 3.6 metres high, and the stone walls are up to 4.1 metres thick. The tower was likely inhabited by the principal family or clan of the area but also served as a last resort for the village in case of an attack.

The broch continued to be inhabited while it began to collapse and the original structures were altered. The cistern was filled in and the interior was repartitioned. The ruin visible today reflects this secondary phase of the broch's use.

The site is surrounded by three ditches cut out of the rock with stone ramparts, encircling an area of around 45 metres diameter. The remains of numerous small stone dwellings with small yards and sheds can be found between the inner ditch and the tower. These were built after the tower, but were a part of the settlement's initial conception. A 'main street' connects the outer entrance to the broch. The settlement is the best-preserved of all broch villages.

Pieces of a Roman amphora dating to before 60 AD were found here, lending weight to the record that a 'King of Orkney' submitted to Emperor Claudius at Colchester in 43 AD.

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In the 9th century, a Norse woman was buried at the site in a stone-lined grave with two bronze brooches and a sickle and knife made from iron. Other finds suggest that Norse men were buried here too.

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