Cattedrale di Santa Maria Assunta

The Cathedral of Santa Maria Assunta is the principal church of Cervia Nuova, the planned salt town established near the coast in the late seventeenth century. Bishop Francesco Riccamonti laid its first stone in 1699. Its unfinished brick façade and Baroque interior frame a collection that includes a panel attributed to Barbara Longhi and a polychrome marble altar transferred from Forlì.

Why it matters

The cathedral and Cervia Nuova were created as part of the same urban transformation, following the abandonment of the older settlement in the salt pan. The church remains a co-cathedral of the Archdiocese of Ravenna-Cervia. Its art and architecture reflect both the late-seventeenth- and early-eighteenth-century creation of the new town and the older devotional traditions of the diocese.

What to notice

Francesco Fontana’s design called for a marble-clad façade with Corinthian columns and a pediment, but the facing was never completed. The interior has a Latin-cross plan with a single nave and six side chapels. The collection includes a painting of San Paterniano, a Madonna della Neve attributed to Barbara Longhi, and a San Giuseppe with the Christ Child from the school of Guercino. The polychrome marble high altar was transferred from a Dominican church in Forlì; its Assumption with Saints Nicholas and Bartholomew is by Giovanni Barbiani.

Context and history

The Holy See approved the new town in 1697, and work on its layout began in January 1698. Riccamonti laid the cathedral’s first stone on 18 June 1699; the first Mass was celebrated on 8 June 1702. A bell tower was added in 1750 beside the Bishop’s Palace, completed in 1702. The cathedral’s foundation belongs to the broader relocation of Cervia from the salt pan to a new site near the coast.