Collegiata di San Martino

About

The collegiate church of San Martino is a religious building located in the historic center of Cerreto Sannita. First mentioned in 972, it constituted one of the six parishes of ancient Cerreto. On February 22, 1544, Bishop Alberico Giaquinto, with the consent of Count Diomede III Carafa and the universitas (municipal administration of the time), erected the church into a collegiate church, endowing it with a chapter of eleven canons plus the archpriest and unifying the other five parishes. Razed to the ground by the earthquake of June 5, 1688, it was rebuilt in the center of the new urban fabric desired by Count Marzio Carafa and his brother Marino, thanks to funds provided by the universitas, the confraternity of the Most Holy Body of Christ and the feudal lords. The collegiate church, characterized by the external stone staircase that divides into four branches, with its 2,000 m2 (22,000 sq ft) of surface area, 58.5 m (192 ft) in length, 32.4 m (106 ft) in width and 25 m (82 ft) in height, is the largest church in the diocese of Cerreto Sannita-Telese-Sant'Agata de' Goti. Inside it are preserved numerous 18th-century paintings, valuable wooden statues, some ancient Cerretese ceramic...

The church of St. Martin of Tours is first mentioned in a diploma dated April 22, 972, kept at the library of the Sannio Museum in Benevento. This ancient document lists a series of donations that Emperor Otto I of Saxony made in favor of Abbot Azzone of St. Sofia in Benevento, and among the various donations a chapel located in Cerreto and dedicated to St. Martin is mentioned. This donation was ratified in 1022 and 1038 by Emperors Henry II and Conrad II, respectively, and in 1088 by Pope Gregory VII.

There is no other news until July 15, 1364, when Abbot Tommaso, archpriest of the church of San Martino, is counted among the witnesses to a sentence issued by the bishop of Telese Giacomo II in the litigation between the monastery of San Vittorino in Benevento and the Benedictine abbey of Santissimo Salvatore in San Salvatore Telesino. The archpriest signed himself as follows: " Ego abbas Thomas archipresbiter Cerreti testis predictus dicte sententie interfui et manu propria me subscripsi " (I Abbot Thomas, archpriest of Cerreto, was present at the statement of the aforementioned witness and by my own hand I subscribe).

At the turn of the 15th and 16th centuries the church is described as resembling a "ruined house" having a roof of "small timbers." Despite this it was one of the six parishes of ancient Cerreto and was cared for by an archpriest who celebrated the Eucharist daily.

Subsequent news comes in the first decades of the sixteenth century: in 1525 archpriest Giacomo de Blasiis accepted a substantial donation of movable and immovable property, in his capacity as rector of the church of Sant'Angelo "outside the walls"; in 1528 Don Dionisio de Donatis, archpriest of San Martino, undertook to provide sacred service in the church of San Leonardo in Cerreto, under the patronage of the universitas (municipal administration of the time); in 1540 by decree of the Holy See the tithes due to the archpriest were reduced.

By decree of February 22, 1544, Bishop Alberico Giaquinto - with the consent of Count Diomede III Carafa and the universitas - erected the church of San Martino as a collegiate church. By the same decree, Bishop Giaquinto suppressed the other five existing parishes in Cerreto (San Bartolomeo, San Biagio, San Cristoforo, Sant'Angelo and Santa Maria) and some smaller churches (San Pietro, San Giorgio, Santa Croce, San Basilio, San Gennaro, San Giacomo, San Nicola, Sant'Angelo in Sasso and San Leonardo), aggregating their rents to the newly established collegiate. The creation of a collegiate church, desired by the citizens of Cerreto already in the Civic Statutes of 1541, was also strongly desired by the clergy both for the purpose of improving the care of souls and in order to ensure a better livelihood for the priests.

The decree establishing the collegiate received apostolic assent in a provision of Pope Paul III dated April 21, 1548.

The collegiate church was endowed with a chapter consisting of eleven canons plus the archpriest. The Carafa counts reserved the right to appoint and revoke the archpriest; the latter, who had to be "able and suitable" to hold that office, could only be chosen from among priests born in Cerreto or sons of people from Cerreto.

From the mid-16th century to the earthquake of June 5, 1688

Soon after the church was erected as a collegiate church, it became necessary to provide for the expansion of the building in order to worthily accommodate the faithful. The extension work, subsidized by the confraternity of the Most Holy Body of Christ of Cerreto, proceeded little by little and was completed by the end of the 16th century.

In 1596 Bishop Eugenio Savino noted that the architecture had a Latin cross plan with the nave divided from the aisles by eight arches on each side. Despite this, the collegiate church was not sufficient to accommodate all the people of Cerreto, who numbered about ten thousand at that time.

The church had, in addition to the high altar, twenty other altars distributed in as many chapels. In a niche to the side of the high altar on May 5, 1596, during a solemn ceremony, the relics of several saints from the falling cathedral of the Holy Cross in Telese were placed.

- the Chapel of the Holy Cross, built at the behest of Baron Pietro Mazzacane. In the first half of the seventeenth century it enjoyed such a large income that 156 Masses a year were celebrated there;

- the chapel of St. Catherine, built at the behest of Baron Mario Ciaburro. Located in the penultimate left aisle, it was furnished with an altarpiece depicting the Stories from the Life of St. Catherine, painted in 1594 by Annibale Scattone and valued at 55 ducats.

- the chapel of Santa Maria della Pietà, built by Bishop Annibale Cotugno, who in 1580 endowed it with various furnishings worth a total of 150 ducats. This chapel had a burial ground that was used to inter the Cerreto bishops until the completion of St. Leonard's Cathedral. The ceiling of the central nave was covered with gold leaf while the apse was entirely frescoed.

The church, which was located in the middle of the walled village of ancient Cerreto, overlooked a square.

Originally the bells found their place on the sacristy, but in 1616, thanks to a substantial donation made by the Cerreto resident Antonio Castelli, it was possible to hold a public auction for the purpose of building a bell tower. The bell tower of the collegiate church, admired by citizens and outsiders alike for its grandeur and height, was similar to the bell tower of the basilica sanctuary of Santa Maria del Carmine Maggiore in Naples.

The June 5, 1688 earthquake razed ancient Cerreto and the collegiate church to the ground. Archpriest Andrea Mazzacane and two canons died under the rubble.

One of the eight saved canons of the collegiate church, Giovan Lorenzo Dalio, thus expressed himself about the collapse of the bell tower and the church in the elegy "The Fall of Cerreto by the Earthquake":

[...]"[...]You (the earthquake) dragged with you / the sacred golden tower Eighth wonder / of thy divine patron [...] [...] And thou, Martin divine / thou shouldst not perhaps, from the starry seat / of the Father of mortals Defend the threshold / Of thy wondrous temple?"