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medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture On Monday, March 14, 2005. at 7:00 pm, Phyllis wrote: > Today (15. March) is the feast day of: > Matrona (?) You have a pick of three saints. Candidate #1 was the > Christian slave of a Jewish mistress, beaten to death when she > remained obstinate in her faith. #2 was a native of Barcelona, taken > to Rome, where she was executed for tending to Christian prisoners. > #3 was a Portuguese woman purportedly of royal blood, who suffered > from chronic dysentery. She was told by an angel to go to Italy for > a cure. She died in Capua, where she is the patron saint of those > suffering from that unfortunate complaint. All that flurry of interest over Heldradus of Novalesa caused me to forget that one of the really lesser known saints from the Regno was coming up. That is of course Phyllis' candidate # 3, traditionally known as Matrona of Capua. Capua has moved since M.'s day: sacked by Muslim raiders ca. 840, it was refounded on its present site in 856. But M. has stayed put in her chapel in the formerly late fifth-/early sixth-century church of St. Priscus that once stood outside of old Capua (today's Santa Maria Capua Vetere) and that now is in the municipality of San Prisco (CE). The late antique church of St. Priscus was once richly decorated: it had in its cupola a series of mosaic portraits of early Campanian saints, some of which were still legible before the decayed building was replaced in the eighteenth century by the present structure, and in the seventeenth century it also possessed wall paintings from which the Campanian church historian Michele Monaco created a brief Vita published in his _Sanctuarium Capuanum_ (1630), shown here: http://www.library.georgetown.edu/dept/speccoll/campania/gallery%201/3/pages/img_0014.htm TinyURL for this: http://tinyurl.com/4wypt A few years later Monaco's nephew, Silvestro Acosta, published another account of M. that differs in the few details. How much the now lost paintings actually conveyed and how much of these Acta are early modern invention or misinterpretation is not known. But though the paintings are gone and the Acta are suspect, M.'s burial chapel remains in place within the church's eighteenth-century successor shown here: http://utenti.quipo.it/casertaoltrelareggia/Schede/2000_2001/Scheda_84.htm TinyURL for this: http://tinyurl.com/4kc8f The facade and belltower are by the Neapolitan architect Luigi Vanvitelli (1700-1773), whose oeuvre is one of the crowning achievements of the Regno during its Bourbon period. A very brief summary is here: http://www.italycyberguide.com/Art/artistsarchite/vanvitelli.htm The chapel itself is noted for its late fifth- / early sixth-century vault mosaics. Views of these, of M.'s late antique sarcophagus, and of a column capital in the chapel are here: http://www.sanprisco.net/archeologia/sacello/sacello.htm One wishes there were more. Best, John Dillon ********************************************************************** To join the list, send the message: join medieval-religion YOUR NAME to: [log in to unmask] To send a message to the list, address it to: [log in to unmask] To leave the list, send the message: leave medieval-religion to: [log in to unmask] In order to report problems or to contact the list's owners, write to: [log in to unmask] For further information, visit our web site: http://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/lists/medieval-religion.html