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Fortified churches between the eleventh and sixteenth centuries on Elba IslandAgainst the threat of Islamic, Norman and Greek pirates, starting from the eighth century, or due to conflicts with the Genoese, Catalans, Neapolitans and French, up to the English and Dutch corsairs from the sixteenth century, Elba island is organized with a respectable defensive apparatus, especially thanks to the Pisans and the Lordship of the Appiano. In addition to a system of fortresses, towers positioned on the shore of the beaches and watch towers placed on the mountain, the presence of some fortified churches from the eleventh century until the sixteenth century is very unusual: the church of San Niccolò in San Piero in Campo, the church of Sant’Ilario, the church of San Niccolò in Poggio, and of the church of Saints Martyrs Giacomo and Quirico in Rio nell’Elba. Main tasks of the research are: study of the transformations of the churches of San Niccolò in San Piero in Campo and of the church of Sant’Ilario, located on the southern slope of Monte Capanne, where was used the construction technique of the granite of the Elba; the way of communicating cultural heritage among scholars or tourists who are fascinated by such structures. Through an initial operation of instrumental survey with 3D laser scanning and drone photogrammetry it is possible to return the current 3D models of the churches. The second step goes on two main directions: on one hand identifying the conservative restoration operations for the fortified churches; on the other hand allowing the dissemination to a wider public of the history of the two fortified churches.

The story of Calabria, between the ninth and eleventh centuries, was marked by the coexistence of different political and religious souls. Along the Valley of the Crati (up to Cosenza) the Lombard presence came while, further south, the Byzantine people acted with the formation of the Thema of Calabria. In addition, the migration waves of the eighth century led to the ‘bizantinizzazione’ of church and monastic structures. But, since the second half of the ninth century, the influence of Montecassino archcenoby began to put some full stops, in the slow process of recovery of the South to the Roman obedience and to the liturgical latinity. This gave birth to the integration processes of the two religious components; but with the spread of the Congregation Cavense (1025), the Italo-Greek monastic component, especially that along the border and in the area of Calabria and Lucania of Mercurion, ended with being more and more incorporated into the Latin monastic reorganization. This complex situation, since the...

In the middle of the eleventh century, a fresco was made in the apse of the so-called oratory above the underground basilica of Saint Hermes, excavated in the homonymous catacombs of the Via Salaria Vetus. After the restoration, directed by the Pontifical Commission for Sacred Archaeology, it is quite clear now the solemn decorative program, which focuses on Christ between angels and the Virgin Mary, along with St. Hermes, St. John the Evangelist and St. Benedict, depicted here with an early iconography, but already canonical.

As in the records of many medieval cities, arrivals and translations of holy relics recur in the history of Genoa. The Mediterranean is the constant background in this analysis; in many cases, the individual events, considered over the long term, characterize actual historical dynamics or are symbols of new political, legal, social and economic settlement. After a brief summary of the earliest relic translations - which took place between the late-sixth and tenth centuries and are attested in the historical, hagiographical, and archaeological sources - this paper turns to some case studies of the eleventh and thirteenth centuries, the memory of which is also recorded through such material evidence as reliquaries still preserved in Genoese and Ligurian churches and museums. Among these, the paper highlights the silver casket containing the ashes of Saint John the Baptist, which reached Genoa in the crucial time of Crusade, reform, and birth of the Comune which advanced the creation of a veritable official ...