Chiesa di San Marco

Just outside the medieval walls of Jesi, the brick Gothic church of San Marco stands on a rise. Its three naves are divided by octagonal piers, and fragments of a fourteenth-century fresco cycle associated with the Rimini school survive inside.

Why it matters

San Marco preserves a Franciscan Gothic church beyond the city walls. Tradition identifies the site as a former Benedictine abbey later transferred to the Franciscans; some accounts associate this transfer with a visit by Francis of Assisi. The friars left the exposed site in 1439, and the church was restored in the nineteenth century.

What to notice

The brick façade has a white marble portal beneath a terracotta rose window. Inside, pointed arches and cross vaults rest on octagonal piers. Surviving frescoes include a Crucifixion on the apse arch, an Annunciation and a Dormitio Virginis. The nineteenth-century restoration by Angelo Angelucci also shaped the building's present appearance, so medieval fragments sit alongside later plaster and repair work.

Context and history

The church developed on a hill outside Jesi, traditionally associated with a Benedictine abbey. It was rebuilt along Gothic lines in the second half of the thirteenth century and transferred to the Franciscans. In 1439, attacks by armed bands led the friars to move their community to San Floriano within the city walls. The church then fell into disuse. Angelo Angelucci directed a nineteenth-century restoration, and Carmelite nuns later settled in the neighbouring monastery.