San Salvatore in Lauro

---

Map

San Salvatore in Lauro

---

The church of San Salvatore in Lauro was built by Ottaviano Nonni (1536-1606), better known as Il Mascherino, between 1594 and 1600. However, the facade (1857-62) is the work of Camillo Guglielmetti. 

​San Salvatore in Lauro is the regional church for expatriates of Ascoli Piceno, a province in the Marche, a region in eastern Italy. The inscription at the top of the facade proclaims: MARIAE LAVRETANAE PICENI PATRONAE (To Mary of Loreto, Patroness of the Picenese). 

The Madonna of Loreto

The facade of the church bears a bas-relief of a house being held aloft by three angels. Perched on the roof of the house are the Madonna and Child. The relief is by Rinaldo Rinaldi (1793-1873) and depicts the miracle of the holy house of Loreto. According to legend, the very house in which the Virgin Mary was born, and in which she conceived Jesus, was transported by angels all the way from Nazareth to Loreto, a small town in the Marche region of Italy.

Tradition holds that the house arrived in Loreto during the night of December 9th 1294, after a miraculous rescue from the Holy Land as the Crusaders were driven out of Palestine. For centuries, it has been enshrined in the Basilica di Santa Casa, making the church a major point of the Marian pilgrimage. In 1920, Pope Benedict XV (r. 1914-22) declared the Virgin Mary, in her role as the Madonna of Loreto, to be the patron saint of air travellers. 

​On first entering the church one feels the shadow of Palladio.

Nave

The high altar (1792) was designed by the Roman architect Antonio Asprucci (1723-1808). 

High Altar

The statue in the niche is a copy of the famous Madonna Nera di Loreto (Black Madonna of Loreto), which was lost in a fire in 1921, while the glory of angels is the work of the sculptor Vincenzo Pacetti (1746-1820).  

The Black Madonna of Loreto (copy)

---