Castelseprio

CASTELSEPRIO. - A comune in the province of Como. The church of S. Maria foris portas, particularly notable for its plan and for its pictorial decoration, is preceded by a covered and rather low narthex and is single-naved and apsidal. Two other apses, of which only the structures remain, opened along the sides: they were reached through two narrow arches, so that they must have appeared as though separated from the nave. In plan, therefore, the building fits neither the typical longitudinal scheme nor that of a τριστικό: this is probably due to the fact that in the architect's conception the construction, undoubtedly quite close to a central plan, was supposed to have an elevation and a roofing system different from those it later received, perhaps for reasons of a technical nature.

Bognetti holds that the church dates back to the 7th century and that it is due to a community of Eastern monks who had moved to Italy. In the apse, beneath the frescoes of an unknown Lombard artist of the fifteenth century, paintings of great interest have been revealed, brought back to light after 1944. They are arranged in two long, superimposed horizontal bands and depict scenes relating to the cycle of the infancy of Jesus. Noteworthy is that of the Annunciation, inspired by the apocryphal gospels, since the Virgin is represented seated in the act of spinning. The cycle is interrupted at the center by a roundel in which the bust of the Παντοκράτωρ appears. Other paintings decorated the triumphal arch: among those preserved is a medallion with the symbol of the ἐνουχαία flanked by two archangels who bear aloft a staurophoric globe. The frescoes are certainly earlier than the second half of the 9th century: in fact, on the painted plaster graffiti have been found that refer to the time of the Milanese archbishop Tadone (863-65). Perhaps they are to be attributed to the 7th century. As regards the composition and the use of colors, the artist, endowed with a powerful personality, follows the Hellenistic pictorial tradition and rapidly traces, with an elegant and lively manner, the figures and the backgrounds of his compositions. De Capitani d'Arzago has advanced the hypothesis that he was a Melchite Easterner who perhaps had to leave Palestine or Syria or Egypt following a persecution by the nationalist Monophysite populace. - See Pl. LIX.

Giuseppe Bovini