Chiesa di San Maurizio

The Church of San Maurizio stands in the place where in the 13^th century the Order of the Humiliati built the oratory and the nearby convent of Santa Margherita.

In 1469 a new church named after the Saints Margherita and Caterina replaced the oratory.

The progressive deterioration of the building over time required drastic renewal work in 1736. However, a tiny part of the convent was kept and is still visible in the present apartment blocks. The original parts that have endured through centuries are the main door of the convent (today a private entrance), the cellar and the well. Inside the church are frescoes and paintings from the Church of Santa Margherita and from the old, knocked-down Church of San Maurizio whose name was given to the more recent sacred building in 1881. The cloister of the convent was demolished in 1890.

The convent of Santa Margherita underwent a delicate period during the Spanish dominion and became renowned as the scenario of a great scandal portrayed by Alessandro Manzoni in his novel “ I Promessi Sposi” (“The Betrothed”).

The core of the incident is the sacrilegious relationship between the nun Virginia Maria - whom Manzoni called with the fictitious name nun Gertrude, namely the “Nun of Monza” - and the woeful Egidio (born as Count Gian Paolo Osio). Actually, the real monastic name of Gertrude was nun Virginia Maria, in the world Countess Marianna de Leya y Marino, daughter of the Lord of Monza, the Spanish Count Martino de Leyva y de la Cueva-Cabrera.

At the end of a clamorous trial, in 1608 nun Virginia was sentenced to isolation for 21 years and was excluded from her noble family, while Osio - guilty also of having killed a lay sister - was eventually executed.

 

 

 

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