Alla ricerca di un Medioevo perduto. La basilica di San Giorgio Maggiore a Napoli (iv-xvii secolo)

Abstract

The basilica of San Giorgio Maggiore in Naples played an important role in the city’s history during the Middle Ages. Built by Bishop Severus (c. 362–408), it was the earliest of the city’s four baptismal basilicas (Catolicae maiores) and was governed by a priestly congregation controlled by the Chapter of the cathedral. The seat of religious and civic institutions, it was the site of public ceremonies performed by the bishop. Architect Cosimo Fanzago rebuilt the church after it was largely destroyed by fire in 1640, but visual and textual sources enable reconstruction of its primitive features. The original church’s only surviving structure is the Early Christian apse, pierced by three arches resting on marble columns. The apse’s exact chronology and the function of its triforium are still debated. As affirmed by the ninth-century Gesta episcoporum Neapolitanorum, the apse was decorated with a mosaic, the iconography of which is investigated here. The church’s interior was divided by marble columns into ...