San Bernardino alle Ossa is a church in

Milan Milan ( , , Lombard: ; it, Milano ) is a city in northern Italy, capital of Lombardy, and the second-most populous city proper in Italy after Rome. The city proper has a population of about 1.4 million, while its metropolitan city ...

, northern Italy, best known for its

ossuary An ossuary is a chest, box, building, well, or site made to serve as the final resting place of human skeletal remains. They are frequently used where burial space is scarce. A body is first buried in a temporary grave, then after some years the ...

, a small side chapel decorated with numerous human skulls and bones. In 1210, when an adjacent cemetery ran out of space, a room was built to hold bones. A church was attached in 1269. Renovated in 1679, it was destroyed by a fire in 1712. A new bigger church was then attached to the older one and dedicated to

Saint Bernardino of Siena Bernardino of Siena, OFM (8 September 138020 May 1444), also known as Bernardine, was an Italian priest and Franciscan missionary preacher in Italy. He was a systematizer of Scholastic economics. His preaching, his book burnings, and his " b ...

History

The church's origins date to 1145, when a hospital and a cemetery were built in front of the basilica of Santo Stefano Maggiore. In 1210 a chamber was built to house bones from the cemetery, next to which a church was built in 1269. It was restored for the first time in 1679 by Giovanni Andrea Biffi, who modified the façade and decorated the walls of the ossuary with human skulls and tibiae. The church was destroyed in 1712; it was replaced by a new edifice designed by

Carlo Giuseppe Merlo Carlo Giuseppe Merlo (5 November 1690 – 13 February 1760) was an Italian architect of the late-Baroque period; born in Milan, Italy. He was a pupil of Francesco Bianchi, and from 1708 to 1716 trained in the College of Engineers and Archi ...

, featuring a central plan and larger size reflecting the increasing popularity of the ossuary. The new church, connected to the former one by an

ambulatory The ambulatory ( la, ambulatorium, ‘walking place’) is the covered passage around a cloister or the processional way around the east end of a cathedral or large church and behind the high altar. The first ambulatory was in France in the 11th ...

, was dedicated to St. Bernardino of Siena. The façade was completed in 1776.

Overview

The interior has an octagonal plan, with Baroque-style decorations. The several chapels have paintings from the 16th-18th centuries. The ossuary's vault was frescoed in 1695 by

Sebastiano Ricci Sebastiano Ricci (1 August 165915 May 1734) was an Italian painter of the late Baroque school of Venice. About the same age as Piazzetta, and an elder contemporary of Tiepolo, he represents a late version of the vigorous and luminous Cortonesq ...

with a ''Triumph of Souls and Flying Angels'', while in the

pendentive In architecture, a pendentive is a constructional device permitting the placing of a circular dome over a square room or of an elliptical dome over a rectangular room. The pendentives, which are triangular segments of a sphere, taper to point ...

s are portrayed the Holy Virgin, St. Ambrose, St. Sebastian and St. Bernardino of Siena. Niches and doors are decorated with bones, in

Roccoco Rococo (, also ), less commonly Roccoco or Late Baroque, is an exceptionally ornamental and theatrical style of architecture, art and decoration which combines asymmetry, scrolling curves, gilding, white and pastel colours, sculpted moulding, ...

style. In 1738

King John V of Portugal Dom John V ( pt, João Francisco António José Bento Bernardo; 22 October 1689 – 31 July 1750), known as the Magnanimous (''o Magnânimo'') and the Portuguese Sun King (''o Rei-Sol Português''), was King of Portugal from 9 December 170 ...

was so struck by the chapel, that had a very similar one built at

Évora Évora ( , ) is a city and a municipality in Portugal. It has 53,591 inhabitants (2021), in an area of 1307.08 km2. It is the historic capital of the Alentejo and serves as the seat of the Évora District. Due to its well-preserved old ...

, near

Lisbon Lisbon (; pt, Lisboa ) is the capital and largest city of Portugal, with an estimated population of 544,851 within its administrative limits in an area of 100.05 km2. Lisbon's urban area extends beyond the city's administrative limits w ...

Gallery

File:San b 1.JPG, One wall of the ossuary File:San Bernardino ossuary 1.jpg, The frescoed vault of the ossuary File:San Bernardino ossuary 2.jpg, Inner view of the ossuary

Notes

{{DEFAULTSORT:San Bernardino Alle Ossa Roman Catholic churches completed in 1776 18th-century Roman Catholic church buildings in Italy Bernardino alle Ossa Ossuaries Mannerist architecture in Italy Tourist attractions in Milan