EUHeritageTOUR-TourGuide-Basic-EN

Italy
Matera,
Benevento,
Foggia,Trevi,
Assisi, Brescia
Longobards and the
Places of the Power.
Sanctuary of St. Michael,
Foggia
Description
After 650, the Longobards from Benevento widened the
territory of the Duchy by means of annexing the Gargano
region, where the cult of the Archangel Michael was
established from the 5th century onwards; such cult
proved to be congenial to the sensitivity of the
Longobards, for it showed attributes and characteristics
of the pagan Woden, considered the supreme God, the
god of war, psychopomp, protector of heroes and
warriors.From the 7th century, the Gargano Sanctuary
became the national Sanctuary of the Longobards and
the most important place of worship of Saint Michael,
deeply influencing the spread of the devotion for St.
Michael in the Western Europe and becoming a model for
the hundreds of Sanctuaries dedicated all over Europe,
including the most famous Mont Saint Michel on the
border of Brittany. The cult of S. Michael the Archangel
gave rise to a conspicuous heritage of faith, art and
culture between the 6th and 8th centuries, leaving
evidences in the folk traditions – still alive in the never
ended devotion to the Angel – in the anthroponym, in the
material culture. It was a heterogeneous environment from
the social point of view, by ethnicity, by the pilgrims’
provenance, that shows how central the role of the
Apulian Sanctuary was, in relation to not only the
Longobards.With the Longobards, however, it became
one of the most important places of worship in
Christendom and was an international destination of
pilgrimage, one of the last stages on the road that lead to
the Holy Land, coinciding with the ancient route of the
Trajan Way in Southern Italy, which since then took the
name of Via Sacra Langobardorum.The anthropic
structures that redefined for liturgical reasons the natural
cave and the exceptional epigraphical body on display on
the Sanctuary’s columns and capitols, allow to reconstruct
an extraordinary context, a meeting place of different
realities. The main Longobard dynasties, the Dukes of
Benevento but also those of Pavia and Brescia – as
testified by inscription (graffiti) preserved in loco - gave
life to vast monumental reconstruction works at the
Sanctuary, to facilitate access to the primitive grotto and
provide hospitality for pilgrims.The historical-cultural
heritage that can be ascribed to the Longobard period –
and today still living -represents a unique evidence in the
definition of Longobard history.
Source: UNESCO/CLT/WHC