Cagliari Cathedral
The Cathedra of Cagliari is a church in Cagliari, Sardinia, Italy.
The church was built in the 13th century in Pisane-Romanesque style, obtaining the cathedral status in 1258. In the 17th and 18th centuries it was renovated along Baroque lines. In the 1930s it finally received the current façade, in a Neo-Romanesque style, inspired to the Cathedral of Pisa.
History
The church was built by the Pisans in their stronghold overlooking the city, Castel di Castro. It had a square plan, with a nave and two aisles, the latter having cross vaults, while the nave had a wooden ceiling. In 1258, after the Pisans had destroyed the capital of the Giudicato of Cagliari, Santa Igia, and of its cathedral, it became the seat of the diocese of Cagliari.
In the 14th century the transept was built, by which the cathedral obtained a Latin cross plan, and the two side entrances. The façade also obtained a Gothic mullioned window and the bell tower was also modified. From the same period is the first chapel, in Italian Gothic style, in the transept's left arm. The right transept was completed after the conquest of Cagliari by the Aragonese, and two further chapels were built.
In 1618 the presbytery was elevated to build a sanctuary for several relics of martyrs. The interior and the façade were remade in Baroque style in 1669-1704. A cupola was built at the center of the transept, and the latter's Gothic chapels were deleted.
The old façade was demolished in the early 20th cenyury, and replaced by a Neo-Romanesque one, along the same lines of the original design, during the 1930s.
Artworks
In the interior, the main attraction is the ambon of Guglielmo, a 12th century couple of pulpits by one Master Guglielmo originally sculpted for the Cathedral of Pisa. It was carried to Cagliari in 1312 and placed in the nave, near to its third columns. In 1669 it was split in two, and the two pulpits placed in their current location. The four marble lions which supported the ambo are now placed at the feet of the presbytery's balaustrade.
Other artworks include a 15th century Flemish triptych (also known as Triptych of Clement VII), attributed to Rogier Van der Weyden, the Baroque funerary monument to Bernardo de La Cabra, archbishop of Cagliari, who died in the plague of 1655, while the left transept houses a 14th chapel and the Mausoleum of the Aragonese King Martin I of Sicily, built in 1676-1680. The latter had died during the conquest of Sardinia in the early 15th century.
In the crpyt is the Sanctuary of the Martyrs, home to 179 niches with relics of Cagliari's martyrs found during excavations in the 17th century near the Basilica of San Saturnino. The sanctuary has three chapels with Baroque decorations.
Sources
- Piseddu, Antioco (2000). Le chiese di Cagliari. Cagliari: Zonza Editori. ISBN 8884700302.
- Coroneo, Roberto (1993). Architettura Romanica dalla metà del Mille al primo '300. Nuoro: Ilisso. ISBN 88-85098-24-X.