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[  CHURCH OF SAN FILIPPO ]

The church originally bore the name of the Quarter of Sant' Andrea, in which it stands. It is referred to thus in the Liber Appassatus of 1339.

In 1644, the Comune of Cagli was asked to make a contribution to the church of Sant' Andrea in order to make it an Oratory dedicated to Saint Philip Neri. However the most substantial re-building work dates from the first half of the 18th Century. The work began in February 1712, designed and executed by Mastro Celle Amatori.

By 1714, the first Oratorian monks were able to move in. The magnificent elliptical cupola was added to the church when it was extended, under the guidance of don Gaetano Palazetti.

The facade remains unfinished. The crossed keys and papal tiara appear over the entrance, with the words "SACROSANCTAE LATERANENSIS ECCLESIAE", indicating that the church was placed under the Chapter of Saint John Lateran in Rome. The brick bell tower was re-structured in 1835.

Externally, the most interesting architectural aspect is the elliptical "fish-scale" cupola. It is now topped with a second drum and a second canopy has been constructed over the first buttressed drum and below the second drum.

The light interior has a lunetted barrelled vault, embellished with ornate stucco moulding. It completes the unified, early 18th Century decoration which is sober and graceful and much influenced by mid-European Baroque. The cardinal virtues - Prudence, Justice, Strength and Temperance - stand in narrow niches while, in the two side chapels at the height of the tympanums of the altars, are the figures of the theological virtues - Faith, Hope and Charity and by the side of them Love.

The 18th Century altarpiece on the graceful main altar depicts The Assumption with the Apostles at the Sepulchre of the Virgin, which is covered with flowers. Saint Peter stands among them in the foreground on the lower left. The 21 mt high elliptical cupola dominates the presbytery.

Four intercommunicating side chapels, each with small elliptical cupolas, stand along the main body of the church. On the altar of the first chapel to the right is the altarpiece of the Madonna and Child, Saint Andrew the Apostle and a Bishop Saint which once stood on the main altar. The Virgin, seated on a pedestal with the prelate's crest of a member of the Bonclerici family, is reminiscent of Zuccari's painting of the Madonna of the Angels, while the emaciated figure of the bishop is thought to be Saint Frederick.

The painting in the right hand chapel of The Death of Saint Francis Xavier (1735) is by Gaetano Lapis. Another painting by Lapis of the Ecstasy of Saint Philip Neri (1754), stands on the altar of the second chapel. The oil on canvas of The Madonna of the Wind was once erroneously attributed also to Lapis.

Finally, the first chapel on the left houses the 18th Century painting of Saints Crispin and Crispian which, according to tradition, was commissioned by the Congregation of Shoemakers, as is suggested by the pile of shoes between the two saints.

text by Albert Mazzacchera

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