About the Basilica di San Marino

According to tradition, the Christian stonemason Marinus emigrated around 297 from the Dalmatian island of Rab, summoned to help rebuild the city walls of Rimini under a decree of Emperor Diocletian. Ordained a deacon by Gaudentius, Bishop of Rimini, Marinus was later falsely accused by a woman claiming to be his estranged wife, and fled to the isolation of Monte Titano, where he built a chapel and lived as a hermit, founding the small monastic community from which the future state of San Marino would grow. On 3 September 301, before his death, Marinus is said to have uttered the words that would become the republic’s founding motto: “Relinquo vos liberos ab utroque homine” — “I leave you free from both men,” meaning free from both emperor and pope. An earlier church dedicated to the saint was already standing on the site by the 4th century, and the first document directly referencing the Pieve di San Marino is dated 31 July 1113. The saint’s relics were rediscovered on 3 March 1586, and on 28 January 1595 some of these relics were formally donated to the island of Rab, Marinus’s birthplace, strengthening the historic bond between the republic and its founder’s homeland. The present basilica was built after the demolition of its predecessor in 1807: the council decided on 24 July 1825 to build a new church on the same site, construction began on 28 July 1826 under the Bolognese architect Achille Serra, and the building was completed and opened to the public on 5 February 1838, in a neoclassical style with a porch of eight Corinthian columns. On 21 July 1926, a century after construction began, Pope Pius XI raised the church to the rank of Minor Basilica. Beneath the high altar, a small urn holds the bones of Saint Marinus, while a marble monument to the right houses a silver reliquary containing the upper part of the saint’s skull, still venerated by pilgrims and visitors today.