Museo del Duomo di Città di Castello

Twenty-five pieces of sixth-century silver, found by a farmer's plough in 1935, gave Città di Castello its diocesan museum. The Museo del Duomo occupies twelve rooms of the ancient canonica beside the cathedral, bringing together early Christian plate, a gilded altar front, paintings by Pinturicchio and Rosso Fiorentino, and works from across the Upper Tiber valley.

Why it matters

The Tesoro di Canoscio, a rare ensemble of sixth-century liturgical silver, came to light at Canoscio in 1935. Bishop Filippo Maria Cipriani founded the diocesan museum in 1940 to preserve it. Installed first in two rooms of the cathedral sacristy, the collection expanded in 1991 and moved in 2000 to the ancient canonica beside the cathedral. It now spans twelve rooms, including a Gothic hall, and documents the art and religious life of the diocese.

What to notice

The Tesoro occupies a dedicated room. Its twenty-five objects include plates, patens, chalices, a covered pyx, strainers, a small bronze ladle and spoons, decorated with fish, crosses and doves. The mix of domestic forms and Christian symbols has led scholars to interpret the silver as household objects donated to a Christian community and adapted for liturgical use; the names Aelianus et Felicitas, incised on a paten, are thought to record the donors. Twin pieces are held in Berlin's Bode Museum. Other highlights include the Paliotto of Celestino II, an embossed and partly gilded silver altar front traditionally said to have been given to the cathedral by the pope, a native of the city, in 1142; a silver crozier attributed to the Sienese goldsmith Goro di Gregorio; Pinturicchio's Madonna panel; and Rosso Fiorentino's Cristo in Gloria of 1528.

Context and history

The museum's objects document the diocese across two millennia. A parchment dated 6 November 1163 records Emperor Frederick Barbarossa's protection of the cathedral clergy. The movable-armed Cristo deposto, attributed to a fifteenth-century workshop, was made to be dressed and moved in Holy Week representations, recalling the theatrical dimension of medieval devotion. A notarial deed records that Bishop Sirobaldi of Perugia entrusted the crozier to Bartolomeo Fucci for safekeeping in 1436. Works removed from the cathedral over the centuries, including Rosso Fiorentino's altarpiece commissioned by the Compagnia del Corpus Domini, are displayed alongside objects from sanctuaries and parishes across the Alta Umbria dioceses.