The history of the sacred places of Sirmione

Thanks to the passion and perseverance of Antonio Merlin, the book La storia religiosa di Sirmione has been published, taken from the text by Monsignor Angelo Orlandi which traces the places of worship, the churches, the names of the religious and the historical events that have marked the evangelization of the Sirmione area. The volume is embellished with a preface and a poem by Mario Arduino, the unforgettable Mayor of Sirmione, poet and historian in love with the city of him.

The book (in Italian only) is available for consultation at the Public Library of Sirmione, where the original typescripts from which the text is taken are kept. These are pages that launch a bridge over a past that is also very distant from which interesting aspects resurface not only of the religious life of the past, but also of the civil and economic life of a community that was gradually forming, gathering in devotion and in the care of its own religious temples.

The text, published last October by Acquario del Garda Editore and edited by Antonio Merlin, was born from a project dating back to 2010 and presents to the public research dating back to the 70s of the last century that Monsignor Orlandi, then head of the library of the Episcopal Seminary of Verona, he had conducted starting from the consultations of ancient sources. The study provides a valuable testimony of the facts related to the financing, construction and restoration of the churches of Sirmione.

In most cases the buildings mentioned have come down to us, many transformed and adapted with the succession of needs that the different eras presented. In other cases the text mentions churches and places of worship of which only written memory remains. Titles of ancient churches to San Martino and San Vito arouse great curiosity and suggest a very early diffusion of Christian worship in the peninsula.

The exhibition of religious events accompanies the reader over time, opening up panoramas of magnificent people and places: Colle di Cortine and the memory of the ancient Roman fortress, the Longobard era with Queen Ansa who founded a monastery dedicated to San Salvatore, the testament of Cunimondo for the benefit of the churches of the community. Figures who speak to us from a distant past and who embellish the historical texture of events.

Giovanni Vigna on the Corriere della Sera dedicates a review to “La storia religiosa di Sirmione” (article in Italian only)