Collegiate Church of Domodossola

Domodossola
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How to get

By car: the A26 motorway continues after Gravellona Toce as the Simplon dual carriageway. Take this road and exit at Domodossola.
By train: the international station of Domodossola is the terminal of the Domodossola-Milan and Domodossola-Novara lines. There is also a frequent service to Switzerland. The Domodossola-Locarno railway, better known as the “Vigezzina”, also starts from the station.

About

The imposing Collegiate Church of Domodossola, dedicated to the martyrs Gervasio and Protasio, the patron saints of the town, stands in the historic centre of the burgh.

The present building was designed in the second half of the 18th century by the architect Matteo Zucchi, and was built on the base of an earlier Romanesque church, of which all that remains is the centre doorway and an architrave decorated with a bas relief depicting Charlemagne during the famous battle of Roncisvalle.

The fine, if severe façade is embellished by a seventeenth century prothyrum, or vestibule, frescoed with musician angels by Carlo Mellerio, an artist from the nearby Vigezzo Valley.

The interior conserves a number of masterpieces, the work of well-known artists from the Ossola valleys like Giorgio de Bernardis, who made the great Crucifix on the high altar, or Lorenzo Peretti, who painted the beautiful conches of the nave. The large picture in the choir of Saints Gervasio and Protasio with the Virgin of the Assumption is by Carlo Giuseppe Borgnis, called “lo Sparsicin”, from the Vigezzo Valley.

The church is accompanied by an unusually massive bell tower next to the apse.