Convent Sanctuary of San Michele Arcangelo

The Sanctuary of San Michele Arcangelo is located in Monte Sant'Angelo, in the province of Foggia. It has the dignity of a minor basilica.

It is part of the serial site "Lombards in Italy: the places of power", including seven places full of architectural, pictorial and sculptural testimonies of Lombard art, registered in the UNESCO World Heritage List in June 2011.

Here, on the first slopes of the Gargano, the primitive sanctuary was built in the fifth century, in the Lombard period, near the cave where the Archangel Michael is said to have appeared three times. Fifteen centuries of history marked by the destruction of the barbarians and the reconstructions of pilgrims headed to the Holy Land.

A staircase of 89 steps descends into the entrance vestibule and a 10th century bronze door leads to the basilica, which consists largely of the natural cave. Next to the Sanctuary stands the Casa del Pellegrino, a large guesthouse open to individuals and groups, open all year except for the month of February.

The place has been revered since 490, the year in which, according to tradition, the first apparition of the archangel Michael on the Gargano took place in San Lorenzo Maiorano.

A first sanctuary was built in 493 on the cave where the apparition took place and starting from the 7th century the Gargano area in which the sanctuary stood became part of the Longobard dominions since it was included in the territories of the Duchy of Benevento.

The work of conversion of the Lombards, already started in 589 by Queen Teodolinda, was completed under the reign of Cunipert; the Michaelic cult thus developed within a context of archaic religiosity, in which the veneration of those saints perceived as related to the deities of Norse ancestry of the Germanic tradition was widely followed. In fact, the same warrior virtues once adored in Odin, the Germanic god of war, guide to the afterlife, as well as protector of heroes and warriors, were attributed to the Archangel Michael.

Over time various religious buildings were dedicated to San Michele, in particular in the territory of the Duchy of Benevento, where the first epicenter of the Michaelic cult among the Lombards was precisely the Sanctuary of San Michele Arcangelo and from which it spread throughout the Lombard Kingdom up to soon to be considered the patron saint of the entire people.

The Sanctuary of San Michele Arcangelo thus became the main center of worship of the archangel of the entire West, a typological model for all the others. It was the object of the monumental patronage of both the dukes of Benevento and the kings installed in Pavia, who promoted numerous renovations to facilitate access to the cave of the first apparition and to house pilgrims. The Sanctuary of San Michele Arcangelo thus became one of the main pilgrimage destinations of Christianity, a stop on that variant of the Via Francigena today called Via Sacra Langobardorum that led to the Holy Land. The sanctuary is in fact one of the three major European places of worship dedicated to San Michele, together with the sacred church of San Michele in the Susa valley, and Mont-Saint-Michel in Normandy.

The sanctuary is connected with the city of Lucca for some important facts, such as the presence of a bishop from Lucca Alfonso Puccinelli, who also witnessed the apparition of San Michele in 1656. In Lucca, in the church of San Michele in Foro, there is also a statue very similar to the one present in the sanctuary of San Michele, donated by the bishop Puccinelli to the Republic of Lucca as a symbol of thanks to the city of origin, after the apparition of 1656.

After the fall of the Lombard Kingdom in 774, the sanctuary retained its important function within the Langobardia Minor, always within the Duchy of Benevento which in that same year rose to the rank of principality on the initiative of Arechi II. When Benevento also fell during the 11th century, first the Normans, then the Swabians and the Angevins took care of the sanctuary of San Michele Arcangelo, who in turn linked themselves to the Michaelic cult and further intervened on the structure of the sanctuary itself, modifying it the upper part and enriching it with new decorative elements.

Map: Convent Sanctuary of San Michele Arcangelo