There is limited information about the building: between 1522 and 1532, the San Michele di Montemarciano confraternity, based in the nearby parish church, constructed a simple single-nave oratory to protect the sacred image—a dispenser of graces—which was housed in a tabernacle. The church is indeed a small, single-nave structure with white-plastered interior walls. The façade features a simple circular oculus. The building has a single altar and is roofed with wooden trusses.
As for the dating of the loggia—which, as in other Marian shrines, characterizes the building’s external configuration—it has been broadly attributed to the 17th century. Five bays on each side, irregularly arranged, surround the church on three sides: the loggias follow an ACCCC rhythm, while the façade is articulated by a sequence of five uneven arches (ABBBA), resembling the layout of the Madonna del Pozzo in Empoli and Santa Maria della Pietà in Prato.
The corner solution features a pillar flanked by two half-columns. The pillar extends up to the roof’s springing line, similar to the church of Santa Maria della Pietà in Prato and the Madonna di Montevarchi. The capital is Doric, distinguished by a rather high collar, while the base follows the ancient Vitruvian style. The corner solution, the lexicon of the capitals and column bases, as well as the rhythm of the portico on the façade, create objective resonances with the Prato church, allowing the loggia’s construction to be dated between 1610 and 1615, plausibly attributing it to Gherardo Mechini.
As in the Madonna del Pozzo, an octagonal choir adjoins the building’s single nave—a layout that echoes, albeit on a smaller scale, solutions adopted in Marian shrines, starting with Santa Maria Maggiore in Lanciano, followed by Santa Maria del Fiore in Florence and Bramante’s Santa Maria della Pace in Rome, to cite just a few notable examples.
**Description:**
The fresco depicts the Madonna nursing the Child, flanked by the Archangel Michael and Saint John the Baptist. The Child is naked, holding a small bird in his left hand and wearing a coral necklace around his neck. The church’s only altar, which holds the miraculous fresco (attributed to a follower of Masaccio), was enclosed in 1780 within a structure that left only the Madonna and Child visible in a niche covered with curtains for greater veneration.
**Date of use:** Between 1522 and 1532
**Image:** Painting
**Original location of the shrine:** Hung on the walls around the venerated image. In 1583, an apostolic visitor described a beautiful church with a highly devotional image before which God had performed miracles, as evidenced by the images of men, women, and children covering the walls.
**Types of ex-votos:** Painted tablets, Other
In 1532, the San Michele di Montemarciano confraternity decided to build a shrine where a tabernacle once stood. Little is known about this building: along the old Via Setteponti, in the Piano di Confortona area, there was once a tabernacle with an image of the Virgin Mary, widely venerated by the local population. Similar to the Madonna del Pozzo in Empoli, a simple single-nave oratory was built between 1522 and 1532 to protect the sacred image, commissioned by the San Michele di Montemarciano confraternity based in the nearby parish church. This confraternity had been responsible since at least the 14th century for the hospital that stood where the church now stands—a resting place for the many pilgrims traveling along the Via Setteponti to Rome.
The entry was compiled by Giulietta Cappelletti, Emanuela Ferretti, and Stefano Meacci.
An apostolic visit in 1596 noted that a plenary indulgence could be obtained on the first Sunday of July and the first Sunday of August. Today, a chaplain resides permanently in the shrine. This is the confraternity of San Michele, which oversaw the original hospital on which the shrine was built.
Italy
