Basilica dell'Osservanza
Encyclopedia
The Basilica dell'Osservanza is a church on the outskirts of Siena
, Italy
. It was built around 1490 probably designed by Francesco di Giorgio
and was expanded between 1495 and 1496 by Magnifico Despota Pandolfo Petrucci.
Built in the Renaissance
style, the original complex was damaged during the Siege of Siena in 1554 and after it was rebuilt in the Baroque period and restored between 1922 and 1932. During the Second World War it was almost totally destroyed by American bombing on January 23 1944, but in an ambitious post-war reconstruction project the original basilica was able to be rebuilt through photographs and evidence presented by the monks of the monastery.
Siena
Siena is a city in Tuscany, Italy. It is the capital of the province of Siena.The historic centre of Siena has been declared by UNESCO a World Heritage Site. It is one of the nation's most visited tourist attractions, with over 163,000 international arrivals in 2008...
, Italy
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...
. It was built around 1490 probably designed by Francesco di Giorgio
Francesco di Giorgio
Francesco di Giorgio Martini was an Italian painter of the Sienese School and a sculptor, as well as being, in Nikolaus Pevsner's terms, "one of the most interesting later Quattrocento architects'" and a visionary architectural theorist; as a military engineer he executed architectural designs and...
and was expanded between 1495 and 1496 by Magnifico Despota Pandolfo Petrucci.
Built in the Renaissance
Renaissance
The Renaissance was a cultural movement that spanned roughly the 14th to the 17th century, beginning in Italy in the Late Middle Ages and later spreading to the rest of Europe. The term is also used more loosely to refer to the historical era, but since the changes of the Renaissance were not...
style, the original complex was damaged during the Siege of Siena in 1554 and after it was rebuilt in the Baroque period and restored between 1922 and 1932. During the Second World War it was almost totally destroyed by American bombing on January 23 1944, but in an ambitious post-war reconstruction project the original basilica was able to be rebuilt through photographs and evidence presented by the monks of the monastery.