Loreto – City of Art

On my way to Ascoli I could miss the beautiful city of art Loreto. This little medieval town is situated right near to the sea and the sanctuary is seen already from the motorway. The sanctuary is one of the oldest places of pilgrimage in the Catholic world.

Reading about the history of the city it confuses me. There is first a Catholic legend and that makes the place so ‘holy’. The sanctuary was coming straight from today Palestine. It would be the house where the Virgin Mary was born, raised and where she got the announcement of her holy pregnancy. And where in the end all the apostles of Jesus reunited after his death to celebrate the holy communion.

So far so good. But then in the end of the 13th century Turkish Seljuk took over the place and for preservation angels came and took away the house. Flying with the Virgins home to Italy and placing it just on the top of a hill – the today Loreto.

Well, but for my sake historians found out that stones and architecture found and firmly believed coming from Palestine are originally coming from the Marche. Don’t misunderstand me, I am a believer but it needs a little ‘earthy’ things to me and no angels transporting a heavy stone house from one country to the other. But this is the only real history I was finding. So the city is ‘young’ and founded around the sanctuary. Strange to me as the place would be a typical ‘human’ place.

Instead, the name is coming from something very ‘earthy’: on the hill one could find a lot of laurels growing. Laurel would be Laurus in Latin and Loreto in Italian.

So because of the pilgrimage the place slowly became a village as big that it needed major authorities to lead the whole(y) story. Because of donations by pilgrims the place was frequented as well by robbers. So the first city wall was built around the village. In 1437 there was the first major and in 1468 the construction of a basilica was started.

With the time the city was growing around the sanctuary always having a lot of protection of the church. So during the centuries it became what I could visit today, a fortified little city, well seen from the sea and the surrounding landscape and full of art and beauty. In 2007 there was held the Day of the Youth by Pope Benedikt XVI, who visited the city twice.

I entered the city from one of the huge gates and arrived nearly immediately in the famous Piazza della Madonna with the basilica and the surrounding college of the Jesuits, the Palazzo Comunale (designed by Bramante) and the sanctuary.

Of course, we saw the beauty of the basilica which is one of the most beautiful churches I ever visited. But we were wandering as well in the only two streets going away from the piazza. Here we saw some restaurants and a lot – and I mean A LOT – of shops selling gadgets around the holy church and religious things.

The city is now going as well outside the fortified walls and looks nice but not too interesting. I was there with a friend and as it was lunchtime we entered a restaurant a little further from the center. It was a perfect choice..

Loreto is really a ‘must see’ if you are around at Central Italy and along the Adriatic coast. It has a lot of art to see and the history about this ‘flying’ home is intriguing.

---

Loreto, Le Marche/Italy:

For further information:
Loreto official website (in Italian)
Sanctuary of the Holy House of Loreto

---