Santuario della Madonna di Ceri

The church in the hamlet of Ceri is a diocesan Marian sanctuary dedicated to Our Lady of Ceri, Mother of Mercy. Its presumed medieval origins, venerated Madonna and Child panel, and later role in the devotional life of the Diocese of Porto-Santa Rufina give this small church a history extending well beyond the borgo.

Why it matters

The sanctuary's own account presumes that the church was built in the eleventh century, with three naves and a trussed roof. Its dedication to the Immaculate Conception is documented in seventeenth-century pastoral visits. In 1986 it was established as a diocesan Marian sanctuary under the title Madonna di Ceri; in 1999 it received the title Mother of Mercy, and the Madonna became patroness of the diocese.

What to notice

The sanctuary preserves a wooden tempera panel of the Madonna and Child, attributed to a Sienese-school painter and dated by the parish account to the late fifteenth or early sixteenth century. The panel was restored in 1963, later stolen and recovered. A four-column aedicula built in 1484 to house relics of Pope Felix II altered the church's earlier structure. Medieval frescoes along the nave depict biblical episodes, while the municipality also notes the large painting in the apse.

Context and history

The southern part of the church was badly damaged during Cesare Borgia's 1503 siege of Ceri and was reconstructed. The sanctuary's history records the church's changing Marian titles, from the seventeenth-century dedication to the sanctuary established in 1986 and the 1999 title Mother of Mercy. The Madonna panel remains the focus of this layered history of local and diocesan devotion.