La cattedrale di San Pelino a Corfinio e l’architettura romanica abruzzese

Abstract

The cathedral of San Pelino in Corfinio is a building that replaced a previous church in the 11th century, whose complex construction
history developed perhaps for at least a century and a half.
Next to San Pelino are the tower and the chapel of Sant’Alessandro, which represent the initial nucleus of a cathedral begun by
Bishop Trasmondo around 1077 and soon interrupted.
Having abandoned the construction of this first cathedral, the same bishop began a new and more ambitious building adjacent
to this one, of which however he perhaps only saw the foundations, having died in 1080. Nor were there any works in the years
of his successor, Bishop Giovanni, who was replaced, from 1104, by Bishop Gualterio, who in 1124 consecrated the new cathedral
without probably being able to complete it.
The three-nave system of San Pelino is divided by rectangular-section pillars and ends with a raised presbytery, whose terminal
apse is flanked by two other apses on the transept forming a triconch.

Keywords : Romanesque, cathedral, Abruzzo, Puglia, Holy Land.