Church of Sant'Ambrogio in Buccheri
Davide Mauro - CC4.0
The Mother Church of Buccheri, dedicated to Sant'Ambrogio, Patron Saint of the city, is one of the main places of worship in the city.
Originally the mother church of Buccheri was located at the foot of the Castle in a place still known today as herds of the mother church.
The date of construction of the ancient building is not known but its existence is documented starting from 1474. The earthquake of 1542 seriously damaged the structure, and only towards the first in the 1600s it was decided to restructure it in an almost radical way, renewing the bell tower and enlarging the structure of the church. The earthquake of 1693 razed the sacred building to the ground and it was then decided to move the structure to the current site, where the church of the Trinity once stood. Thus the new church was built to a design by the architect Giuseppe Ferrara.
The facade, which remained incomplete for a long time, was resumed only in 1798. The project, by the Catania masters Giovanni Marino and Antonino Di Stefano, included two orders with eight columns in black stone and a statue of Sant'Ambrogio in the central niche. The columns during construction were replaced by others in white stone. Furthermore, instead of the central clock, two clocks were substituted in the design, one of which was fake. Of the original project, only the first order was partially realized.
The interior, with three naves, is decorated with stuccos by Giuseppe Bianco di Licodia.
The works kept inside are of considerable artistic value of the church: a sixteenth-century Crucifix placed on the main altar; a painting depicting San Michele from the end of the 16th century; the altarpiece depicts "Sant'Ambrogio baptizing Sant'Agostino", by Francesco Mignemi of 1766; the statue of Sant'Ambrogio by don Gaetano Franzese, who sculpted it in 1779.
