Church of Maria SS. of Porto Salvo in Giarre
The Church of Maria SS. of Porto Salvo in Giarre is the building of worship of the hamlet of Altarello.
In the eighteenth century the hamlet of Altarello was a vast agricultural territory frequented by the Capuchin friars who obtained abundant alms for their convents to the point of founding them in this place a small hospice and a chapel, around which a small settlement gradually formed. The church was built at the end of the nineteenth century, blessed in 1889 by Msgr. Gerlando Genuardi, first bishop of Acireale. The sacred building stands in the place where a large icon was located, which gave its name to the hamlet.
The façade, in neoclassical style, has a single trabeated portal surmounted by a lunette window and framed by a pair of columns with Corinthian capitals that support the entablature and a live overhanging tympanum. Two pilaster strips with Corinthian capitals delimit the façade laterally and support a string course, above which the belfry rises.
Inside, with a single nave, there is a very valuable slate painting of the Madonna from the chapel of 'ancient hospice.
