Chiesa di San Gregorio e Ospitale San Gregorio

Beside the Livenza on via Garibaldi, the church and hospice of San Gregorio formed Sacile's charitable heart: pilgrims were sheltered by 1199, the Battuti built the church in 1345, and Bernardino da Portogruaro rebuilt it in 1514. Owned by the town today, the complex hosts concerts, conferences and exhibitions.

Why it matters

The hospice for travellers was recorded here by 1199. The confraternity of the Battuti ran it for centuries, and built the adjacent church in 1345. The town now owns the complex, which serves as a cultural venue for concerts, conferences and exhibitions.

What to notice

At the church, the brick facade opens with a portal and triumphal arch in Istrian stone in Renaissance manner. The fifteenth-century single-nave body contrasts with the Renaissance apse basin and dome. Fragments of fresco survive on the walls, including the city's coat of arms and a Saint James set in a Renaissance aedicula; tomb slabs of noble Sacilese families lie in the floor, and an inscription on the left wall of the apse records the consecrations of March 1524. The bell tower is a seventeenth-century work, built in fits and starts. The Ospitale next door has an entrance portico and interior pillars with traces of painted plaster and later charcoal inscriptions. Restoration uncovered a "butto", a barrel-vaulted waste chute beneath the kitchen, with finds including maiolica, coarse ceramics and glass vessels.

Context and history

The hospice predates the church. Known by 1331 as the Ospitale di Santa Maria della Misericordia and run by the Confraternita dei Battuti, who had taken over from the Giovanniti, it passed to municipal management in 1366 and was enlarged in 1461 to take in the sick described as the poor of Christ; a Latin inscription dated 23 March 1462 records that purpose, and a surgeon joined the staff in 1475. The church beside it was first desired in 1331, built in 1345, dedicated at first to Santa Maria della Misericordia and then to the Madonna and San Gregorio, and to San Gregorio alone from 1437. Bernardino da Portogruaro rebuilt and enlarged it in 1514, and the main and side altars were consecrated in March 1524. After the fall of Venice in 1797 the ospitale quartered troops; hospital activity moved elsewhere in 1879, to a former Augustinian convent, and after the First World War the building housed the district court. The town now owns both buildings and runs them as a centre for concerts, conferences, performances and exhibitions.