Cattedrale di Santa Maria Assunta

The cathedral of Santa Maria Assunta rises over Piazza Duomo in Acqui Terme. Consecrated in 1067, it brings together Romanesque remains, Renaissance sculpture and later decorative campaigns within the principal church of the city's bishopric.

Why it matters

Begun under Bishop Primo and consecrated by Saint Guido, the cathedral preserves the history of Acqui's religious community across many centuries. Its surviving Romanesque apses and crypt form the oldest architectural core, while the interior's later decoration records changing artistic tastes from the sixteenth to the nineteenth century.

What to notice

The Latin-cross plan has five aisles. At the entrance, Giovanni Antonio Pilacorte's portal of 1481 stands beneath the seventeenth-century pronaos; the bell tower was completed in 1479. The crypt occupies the area below the transept and choir. In the left transept, the baroque altar of San Guido carries an altarpiece by David Corte. The cathedral's artistic patrimony also includes Bartolomé Bermejo's Madonna of Montserrat triptych in the chapter room.

Context and history

The medieval foundation was repeatedly enriched rather than reduced to one stylistic period. The triptych, commissioned around 1480 by Acqui merchant Francesco della Chiesa, expresses connections reaching beyond Piedmont. A Lombard altarpiece of 1496 depicts San Guido and the Four Doctors of the Church. The adjoining Canons' Cloister, completed in 1495, extends the cathedral's late-medieval setting around Piazza Duomo.