Sacro Monte e Santuario della Beata Vergine del Soccorso

The Sacro Monte of Ossuccio rises above Lake Como from the shore at Ossuccio to the Sanctuary of the Beata Vergine del Soccorso. Fourteen chapels along the devotional route contain terracotta scenes of the Mysteries of the Rosary; the complex has been part of the UNESCO-listed Sacri Monti of Piedmont and Lombardy since 2003.

Why it matters

Ossuccio is one of the nine Sacri Monti inscribed by UNESCO in 2003 and the only one in the province of Como. Its chapels and sanctuary integrate devotional art and architecture with the mountain landscape. Unlike complexes conceived as a single campaign, Ossuccio developed around an existing Marian shrine.

What to notice

The fourteen chapels contain more than two hundred terracotta figures, mostly life-size, arranged in scenes of the Joyful, Sorrowful and Glorious Mysteries of the Rosary. Sculptures are largely attributed to Agostino Silva, with frescoes by artists including Carlo Gaffuri, Francesco Innocenzo Torriani and Giovan Paolo Recchi. The sanctuary at the summit has a single nave, Baroque stuccoes and vault frescoes by Salvatore Pozzi. Its marble floor combines white Musso and black Varenna stone and is dated 1655; the interior also preserves a fourteenth-century marble statue of the Virgin.

Context and history

A Marian shrine stood on the site by the first half of the sixteenth century, and the sanctuary’s central body was completed in 1537. Work on the chapels began in the seventeenth century, traditionally dated from 1623, under Franciscan custodians including Fra Lorenzo Selenato and his successor Fra Timoteo Snider. Local noble families also supported the project. The fourteen chapels were built from the 1630s into the early eighteenth century; the bell tower, designed by Giuseppe Battista Bianchi, was completed in 1719. The complex forms part of the UNESCO serial property of nine Sacri Monti.