Description: Painting attributed to Francesco Cagnoli, keeper of the gate of the boroughs (16th century). It was executed in a room built between the gate of the Borghi and the drawbridge, which was intended for the guardhouse. It was an image of the Madonna transferred to San Piero in 1588. Entered into use: between the year 1500 and the year 1588 Image: Painting
Original location of the Sanctuary: Near the sacred image. Notes on the collection: It consisted of monetary offerings, gold and silver, silver chalices, gilded silver chalices, silver lamps, silver crosses and candlesticks, gold brocade altar frontals, precious lace, linens, and sacred silk furnishings. Type of ex-votos: Illuminations, Jewelry Current preservation: The ex-votos no longer exist.
They are described in the report that the Bishop of Lucca sent to Rome to obtain authorization to erect the sanctuary.
It was a sanctuary inside the church of San Pier Maggiore. When, on April 25, 1588, the sacred image was transferred to San Pier Maggiore, the church was not yet finished. The people of Lucca offered to complete the church: the masons of Lucca volunteered to build the vault of the main nave of the temple, the people of Verciano, Sorbano, and San Filippo offered more than ninety building stones, those of Porcari and Montuolo offered over thirty carts of bricks, the people of San Lorenzo a Vaccoli and Santa Maria del Giudice fifteen carts of lime; eighty carts of sand were donated by the villagers of Sant’Anna, in addition to offerings of wood and hardware that came from many other villages. The spectacle of the carts arriving in the city was very beautiful because they were decorated like trophies, adorned with greenery and flowers.
Near the ancient Porta dei Borghi in Lucca, there was a room used by soldiers assigned to guard the gate itself. One of the city gate commissioners, seeing that the soldiers were playing dice while the laws of the Republic forbade gambling to soldiers, and hearing the soldier Iacopo di Petro da Capannori blaspheming, ordered the game to stop and harshly reprimanded the blasphemer. The soldier, angered, uttered a horrible blasphemy, and at that very moment, his arm broke between the elbow and shoulder. The incident, verified by the surgeon Niccolò Pardini, quickly spread among the people, who flocked to the place where the fresco of the Virgin was located and began to venerate it. The Council of the Republic, with the permission of Bishop Alessandro Guidiccioni, on April 11, 1588, decided to saw the wall where the image was painted and transport it first to the Palazzo della Signoria and the next day to San Pier Maggiore. The investigative process was recorded by ser Taddeo Giorgi on the same day.
After the demolition of the church, the image was transported in the night between May 28 and 29, fearing a popular uprising, to the church of San Paolino, where it remained until 1812, when it was moved to the Dominican church of San Romano. A few years ago, during the restoration work of the church, the image was stolen. Devotion to the image diminished after the first move to San Paolino and completely faded after the transfer to San Romano, despite all the efforts made by the Dominican friars. This entry was compiled by Rita Bacchiddu.
Impossible to determine, the sanctuary has been demolished.
Soon after, the confraternity of Maria Santissima dei Miracoli was also established, which, however, met in the nearby church of San Giusto, due to lack of space in San Pier Maggiore.
Lucca, Province of Lucca, Italy
