Cripta della Cattedrale

Beneath Ripatransone's co-cathedral is the oratory of San Giovanni Decollato, associated since the sixteenth century with the Confraternita della Misericordia e Morte. Part of the crypt later became the tomb of the city's bishops. Its furnishings include a polychrome Crucifixion by ceramicist Giuseppe Marinucci.

Why it matters

The crypt preserves the oratory of San Giovanni Decollato, a devotional space associated with one of Ripatransone's lay confraternities. In the twentieth century, part of it became the Tomba dei Vescovi, burial place of bishops of the former diocese.

What to notice

The furnishings span several centuries. They include a seventeenth-century wooden crucifix; an altar of the Vergine Addolorata attributed to Giovanni Moschetti, with a Dead Christ by Giuseppe Manzo; nineteenth-century gilded appliqués; and a canvas by Mario Vespasiani depicting the procession of the Cristo Morto. The sacristy contains engravings by Giuseppe Capparoni and a painting by Pietro Capocasa. A Verati organ dates to 1909.

Giuseppe Marinucci's polychrome ceramic Crucifixion adds a modern work to the older carved and painted surfaces. The bishops' tomb represents a later memorial use of the crypt.

Context and history

The Confraternita della Misericordia e Morte — Mercy and Death — belonged to the lay brotherhoods that organised charity and funeral rites in the Papal Marches. Its presence in the cathedral crypt dates from the 1500s, near the period when Ripatransone became a diocese in 1571. The oratory served as a liturgical base for processions of the Dead Christ. In the twentieth century, the crypt also became the Tomba dei Vescovi. Its furnishings reflect both phases, from the baroque Dead Christ to the 1974 Via Crucis and the 1909 organ.