The church of Sant'Eusebio was a church of

Pavia Pavia (, , , ; la, Ticinum; Medieval Latin: ) is a town and comune of south-western Lombardy in northern Italy, south of Milan on the lower Ticino river near its confluence with the Po. It has a population of c. 73,086. The city was the capit ...

, of which today only the crypt remains. The church was probably built by the Lombard king

Rothari Rothari (or Rothair) ( 606 – 652), of the Harodingi, house of Arodus, was king of the Lombards from 636 to 652; previously he had been duke of Brescia. He succeeded Arioald, who was an Arianism, Arian like himself, and was one of the most energe ...

(636-652) as the city's

Arian Arianism ( grc-x-koine, Ἀρειανισμός, ) is a Christological doctrine first attributed to Arius (), a Christian presbyter from Alexandria, Egypt. Arian theology holds that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, who was begotten by God t ...

cathedral. It later became the fulcrum of the conversion to Catholicism of the Lombards initiated by

Theodolinda Theodelinda also spelled ''Theudelinde'' ( 570–628 AD), was a queen of the Lombards by marriage to two consecutive Lombard rulers, Autari and then Agilulf, and regent of Lombardia during the minority of her son Adaloald, and co-regent when ...

and the monks of San Colombano and which later received, precisely in Pavia, a great impulse from King

Aripert I Aripert I (also spelled ''Aribert'') was king of the Lombards (653–661) in Italy. He was the son of Gundoald, Duke of Asti, who had crossed the Alps from Bavaria with his sister Theodelinda. As a relative of the Bavarian ducal house, his was ca ...

(653-661) and from Bishop Anastasius. Pavia, Cripta di Sant'Eusebio

History and architecture

The Church of Sant'Eusebio is mentioned in

Paul the Deacon Paul the Deacon ( 720s 13 April in 796, 797, 798, or 799 AD), also known as ''Paulus Diaconus'', ''Warnefridus'', ''Barnefridus'', or ''Winfridus'', and sometimes suffixed ''Cassinensis'' (''i.e.'' "of Monte Cassino"), was a Benedictine monk, s ...

's ''

Historia Langobardorum The ''History of the Lombards'' or the ''History of the Langobards'' ( la, Historia Langobardorum) is the chief work by Paul the Deacon, written in the late 8th century. This incomplete history in six books was written after 787 and at any rate ...

''. The seventh century apse perimeter remains today. The crypt dates back to the 11th century reconstruction interventions that involved the church, which underwent extensive reconstructions in 1512 and during the 17th century, only to be destroyed and rebuilt again in the 18th century. In 1923, it was decided to definitively demolish it as part of an urban "reorganization" of the area, from which the current Piazza Leonardo da Vinci and the evocative as well as anti-historical isolation of the

towers A tower is a tall structure, taller than it is wide, often by a significant factor. Towers are distinguished from masts by their lack of guy-wires and are therefore, along with tall buildings, self-supporting structures. Towers are specifica ...

emerged. The crypt, although remodeled in the Romanesque period, still retains some capitals from the Lombard period that show a departure from classical art through original forms inspired by jevellery. It was thought that they were originally covered with glass paste or large colored stones, which would have given a more majestic and graceful aspect to the whole; one is divided into triangular closed fields, reminiscent of the contemporary alveolate fibulae, while a second has longitudinal ovals, similar to large water leaves, which seem to derive from the "cicada" fibulae used in all barbarian jevellery from oriental models. The vaults of the latter preserve frescoes, of Byzantine style, depicting busts of saints dating back to the second half of the 12th century. Visiting the crypt requires contacting the Civic Museums.

References

{{Reflist

Bibliography

* ''Musei Civici di Pavia. Pavia longobarda e capitale di regno. Secoli VI- X'', a cura di S. Lomartire, D. Tolomelli, Skira, Milano, 2017. * Piero Majocchi, ''Pavia città regia. Storia e memoria di una capitale altomedievale'', Roma, Viella, 2008. Lombard architecture Romanesque architecture in Pavia