Church and convent Santa Maria delle Grazie

In the place where now stand the church and the convent of Santa Maria delle Grazie there was a votive shrine or small chapel called Santa Maria del Pennocchio” around which there was a large wooded area. According to a tradition that arose already at the end of the sixteenth century Giovanni della Rovere, Lord of Senigallia, built the church and the convent as a vow to Our Lady for the birth of the long-awaited male heir, Francesco Maria, which took place in Senigallia on March 25, 1490. The design and construction of the architectural complex was entrusted to the Florentine architect Baccio Pontelli and the first friars took up residence there already in 1492. Later the factory was revised and enlarged, according to the historical testimony of Vasari, by the architect Girolamo Genga at the behest of Francesco Maria Della Rovere, in an intervention certainly started before the Duke’s death in 1538. Recent studies believe that at the vote for the birth of Francesco Maria, Giovanni decided to build the church to make it the mausoleum of the Della Rovere as well as the church of San Bernardino di Urbino was destined to house the remains of the Montefeltro. And so in Santa Maria delle Grazie find burial over the same John, his brother-in-law Antonello Sanseverino prince of Salerno; his daughter Girolama; his mother Teodora Manerola. The entire complex is finally completed only in 1684, thanks to the initiative of Vittoria Della Rovere Grand Duchess of Tuscany (remembered by the coat of arms of the Medici on the facade, above the portal)the last direct descendant of John to bear the name of the illustrious dynasty. The interior of the church is simple and essential. Here were kept two masterpieces of the Renaissance: “Madonna with Child and Saints” by Perugino and the “Madonna di Senigallia”, by Piero della Francesca. The first panel is now on display at the diocesan art gallery in Senigallia, the second is in the Galleria Nazionale delle Marche in Urbino. Of interest is the valuable handwash of exquisite workmanship fifteenth placed in the sacristy. Today part of the convent houses the Sharecropping History Museum “Sergio Anselmi”, rich of precious testimonies on the peasant civilization and in the two cloisters of the convent are frescoed 28 and 19 lunettes with episodes of the life of Saint Francis of Assisi, painted in 1598 by the painter Pietro Francesco Renulfo.