habitat rupestre.pdf - Società Friulana di Archeologia

RUPESTRIAN CHURCHES OF PALAGIANELLOCRHIMA-CINP projectThe rupestrian Church of St. AndreaThe church dedicated to St. Andrea is located in the easternslope of the gravina, completely isolated in the only tuff masssurviving to massive extraction of construction material madeuntil 1970, that have completely deleted the original complex(fig. 4). The plan is made up of several connected rooms inaxis with the entrance (fig. 6). Nowadys the E-W orientation ofthe spaces is not immediately noticeable because of the changeof access, opened in relatively recent years in the northern partof the church, and which now faces directly onto the bema.This change was necessary since the excavation of the rockmade it impossible to enter through the ancient portal. In theoriginal entrance area, consisting of a round-headed archedopening, there are two arcosolia used as burial places. Thepresence of numerous wall painting, now partly destroyed, isa further evidence of the exceptional importance of the church(fig. 5).Fig. 2 The ‘nameless’ church on the east slope of the valley.Fig. 3 Plan of the ‘nameless’ church.The rupestrian Church of Saint LuciaThe church is located on the western slope of the gravina.The entrance to the interior space is ensured through an architraveddoor surmounted by lunette on the southern side ofthe first room, lateral to the development of the church in theusual East-West axis. The spatial organization currently existing,probably the result of different operations of excavation asshown by the presence of spaces modeled according to variousmetric units, presents spaces distinct in size but all witha common planimetric shape (fig. 7). According to the interpretationof historians and an hypothetical reconstruction ofthe primitive organization, the three rooms may be associatedwith the narthex, the main hall and the bema. The first space,with flat ceiling and provided with two arched niches whichpresent different carved inscriptions, is divided from the hallby a transverse arch, set to two half-pillars, which are used asFig. 4 The rupestrian church of Saint Andrea in the isolated tuff masssurviving to the extraction.Fig. 5 Wall painting representing Saint Vito, 16th century, church of St. Andrea.volumeRicerca_OK_2012-11-15.indd 168 16/11/2012 15:02:56