Chiesa dell'Annunziata

The Church of the Annunziata in Tagliacozzo combines a Counter-Reformation church interior with traces of its earlier role as a confraternal hospital. Its façade retains a stone foundling wheel, while the interior preserves restrained Tuscan pilasters and a barrel-vaulted nave.

Why it matters

The church began as a small foundation with an attached hospital run by the Confraternita dell'Annunziata. In 1584, the Dominicans took possession and rebuilt the complex, giving it the form that defines the church today. The stone “ruota” on the façade recalls the historic practice of anonymously leaving infants in the care of religious institutions.

What to notice

The single nave is covered by a barrel vault and flanked by side chapels. Its Tuscan pilasters create an unbroken architectural order around the interior. The Orsini coat of arms appears twice on a capital, linking the church to the family that supported the complex. The stone foundling wheel remains visible in the façade.

Context and history

The Dominicans arrived in 1584 and enlarged the church and convent. After the order's suppression in 1809, the complex passed to civic uses. Later alterations included a geometric mosaic floor installed in 1869. Restoration in the twentieth century removed some later decoration and returned the interior closer to its seventeenth-century appearance.