Cathedral of Piazza Armerina
Cathedral Basilica of Maria Santissima delle Vittorie in Piazza Armerina stands on the highest point of the city, in the heart of the Monte district.
The building stands on a previous fourteenth-century structure that was built after the miraculous discovery of the image of the Madonna delle Vittorie, which took place on the occasion of the terrible plague of 1348, of which only the bell tower 40 meters high in Gothic-Catalan style remains. The current building was built starting from the early 17th century, thanks to the legacy of Baron Marco Trigona, based on a project by Orazio Torriani. Extremely long construction events led to the completion of the building only in 1740.
The exterior was made of sandstone, which with its characteristic yellow color allows its gigantic teal dome, which with its 76 meters high is the highest in Sicily, to create a splendid chromatic contrast.
The interior, with a single nave, is decorated with stuccoes by the master Gaetano Signorelli in 1870. The main altar is in semiprecious stones of considerable value, executed, together with the floor and the balustrade of the apse, by the master Filippo Pinistri on a design by the architect Giuseppe Venanzio Marvuglia, two pipe organs adorn the central nave, one of which is Donato del Piano from 1741. The decoration of the baptistery on the inner side of the tower is the arch of the Trigona Chapel of the ancient church, carved in alabaster stone by Antonuzzo Gagini in 1594.
Among the works kept inside the church, say no Of great value are: the wooden icon of the patroness Maria Santissima delle Vittorie from the fifteenth century; the wooden cross by an unknown from the 15th century; silver vases supplied by Giuseppe Gagini in 1608; the canvas of the Assumption painted by Filippo Paladini in 1611; the wooden casserizio of the sacristy carved in 1612 by Gian Battista Baldanza; the silver case of the Madonna delle Vittorie, chiseled by the silversmith Giuseppe Capra in 1627; the manta ray in gold, silver and enamels to protect the image of the Patroness, designed and created by the goldsmith Don Camillo Barbavara; the custody of the Blessed Sacrament by Paolo Guarna from 1590; the shrine for the hair of the Virgin by the same master.
