Brick façade of a historic building in Citerna, featuring a large stone doorway topped by a semicircular pediment and a dark wooden double door. On either side, stone buildings, iron lanterns and ornamental plants add character to the small paved square.
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The Church of San Francesco in Citerna

Located at the entrance to the medieval village, along present-day Corso Garibaldi, the Church of San Francesco is Citerna’s most precious artistic treasure, renowned for preserving a masterpiece of the Florentine Renaissance, rediscovered only recently.

Franciscan memories

Saint Francis visited Citerna in 1214 and 1224, during his journeys between Assisi and La Verna, along what is now the Way of Saint Francis.

During one of these stops, in 1214, the miracle of the ants took place: when news spread of the arrival of the Poverello, many people wanted to see him and hear him speak. The crowd was therefore too large to be contained by the narrow streets of the small village, prompting the saint to move out into the open countryside.

Francis leaned against an oak tree, which turned out to be infested with ants. He therefore ordered them to go elsewhere, in the name of God. The ants immediately obeyed. In this place, known as Montesanto (a name that would prove truly prophetic!), a small convent was built in the 13th century, later known as the Convent of the Observants, in memory of Francis’s presence. Ravaged by a fire in 1316, it was abandoned by the friars, who relocated to the small Church of the Crocifisso just outside the town walls.

In the second half of the 15th century, a community of Conventual Franciscans arrived in Citerna and decided to settle within the town walls, building a church and a convent: the original nucleus of the present-day San Francesco complex. Beginning in the early decades of the sixteenth century—as attested by the inscription on the portal lintel—the complex underwent major enlargement and remodelling, although traces of the pre-existing building can still be seen in several places. After these alterations, the church was reconsecrated in 1545, once the work had been completed.

Following the post-Unification suppression of religious orders and confiscation of monastic estates, the building that housed the former convent became the seat of the city’s Town Hall.

Simplicity and splendour

The exterior of the church features a sober, linear architectural style, typical of the Franciscan tradition.

The gabled façade bears witness to numerous alterations: evidence of this can be seen, for example, in the outline of a blind central rose window above the 16th-century doorway; the latter, made of stone, was created by Stefano Acquisti.

The upper level of the building can only be accessed from Piazza del Teatro, enabling the complex to serve as a link between the medieval village and the later Renaissance expansion.

The interior, with a single nave, characteristic of the order's architecture, has a Latin-cross plan and cross-vaulted ceiling. It is spacious and bright, thanks to the rectangular windows opening along the perimeter walls. It is a striking and fascinating space, punctuated by nine side altars made of stucco, sandstone and wood, painted and gilded, which house paintings of the highest historical and artistic value.

Red-brick façade of an old building in the historic centre of Citerna, featuring a stone-framed window in the upper section and a stone arched doorway at the bottom. The weathered brickwork reflects the charm and history of this medieval village.
View from below of an ancient brick and stone arch connecting two buildings in the historic centre of Citerna. The walls, partly plastered and partly exposed, bear the marks of time and are adorned with patches of spontaneous vegetation. Beneath the arch, a stone façade with a circular window can be seen, while the surrounding houses feature terracotta tiled roofs and wooden shutters.

The treasures preserved in the church

In the left transept stands the eighteenth-century Chapel of the Most Holy Crucifix, dominated by a sumptuous carved and gilded altarpiece. At its centre is an ancient wooden Crucifix from the 13th century, believed to be miraculous and therefore surrounded by numerous votive offerings.

According to tradition, one of the friars of the convent, during an especially cold winter, decided to burn the old cross, which had been stored away in the upper storeys. However, as he was about to break it into pieces, the sacred image miraculously opened its eyes.

The wooden Crucifix is set against a painted backdrop, with Saint John and the Virgin on either side, while Saint Francis and the penitent Saint Jerome can be distinguished in the splayed sides of the niche. These works are by Raffaellino Del Colle (1495–1566), a painter from nearby Sansepolcro and the last pupil of Raphael.

The church houses another work by this important Renaissance painter: the beautiful altarpiece depicting the Risen Christ in Glory surrounded by musical angels, with Saints Francis and Michael the Archangel vanquishing Satan, while the arch soffit (or intrados) depicts angels bearing the Cross and the Holy Shroud (right wall of the transept).

To the left of the Crucifix altar is the striking panel painting of the Deposition from the Cross, painted in 1570 by Nicolò Circignani, known as Il Pomarancio (c. 1530–1597).

In the presbytery, visitors can admire the sumptuous, finely decorated high altar, as well as the 16th-century walnut choir, with 25 stalls and a majestic lectern, bearing witness to the intense liturgical and musical life of the convent in centuries past. Above it is a painting from the school of Perugino depicting the Madonna and Child enthroned among Saint Sebastian, Saint Peter of Verona, the Archangel Gabriel and Tobias.

The nave preserves traces of 15th- and 16th-century frescoes.

On the right wall is a niche containing a beautiful fresco of the Virgin and Child, Saint Michael the Archangel and Saint Bernardino of Siena by the school of Luca Signorelli. According to some hypotheses, the angels in the vault may have been painted by the Cortonese master himself, one of the leading figures of the Italian Renaissance (c. 1441/1445–1523), while the saints have been attributed to his pupil, Tommaso Bernabei, known as Il Papacello (1505–1559). Beside the painted niche is an altar with a canvas by the Umbrian artist Simone Ciburri, active in the first half of the 17th century, depicting Saint Anthony of Padua. Notably, the painting shows a panorama of Citerna as it appeared in the 16th century, as well as a contemporary view of Padua, which was crossed at the time by a navigable canal.

The undisputed jewel of the church is the magnificent statue of the Madonna and Child, celebrated as the Madonna of Citerna. This polychrome terracotta masterpiece has been attributed to Donato di Niccolò di Betto Bardi—universally known as Donatello (1386–1466), a towering figure of Renaissance sculpture—following an exhaustive eight-year conservation campaign conducted by Florence's renowned Opificio delle Pietre Dure.

The sculpture, dating to c. 1415–1420, captivates with the expressiveness of the faces, the realism of the garments and the delicate intimacy between the Virgin and Child. Commissioned almost certainly for private worship by a prominent family, its scale made it ideal for both domestic contemplation and portable devotion during sacred processions.

Visiting the Church of San Francesco today means embarking on a journey through the art of central Italy, where Franciscan spirituality meets the mastery of the greatest interpreters of the Renaissance.

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