Vicoforte - Vicoforte

Vicoforte is a center of the Piedmont.

To know

Since December 2017, the Vicoforte Sanctuary has kept the remains of King Vittorio Emanuele III of Savoy and his wife Queen Elena, brought back to Italy respectively by Alexandria of Egypt and from Montpellier in France, where they had been buried in exile.

Geographical notes

In the valleys of the Cuneo area, is about 30 km from Wedge.

Background

The area where Vicoforte is located today was first inhabited by the Ligurian Bagienni, until the conquest which took place in the 1st century BC. by the Romans, who inserted the local populations into the Camilia tribe. To prove the effective presence of Rome in those lands was the discovery of the remains of tombs with artifacts, currently preserved in the civic museum of Wedge.

Little or nothing is known of the early medieval period, it must be reached just before the year one thousand to find mention of Vico as part of the post-Carolingian district known as the Bredulo Committee. Subsequently, in the diploma of 26 January 1041 of the emperor Henry III the Black we find indicated for the first time the parish church of San Pietro in Vico. In 1118 the Vicese community appears already quite active, obtaining in that period the co-ownership of the local woods (an important resource of the time) with the bishop of Asti. In 1210 Vico endowed himself with his first code of written laws, with the collection and editing of the Customs of Vico.

In the first part of the 13th century, a notable movement of Vician families towards a nearby hill called Monte di Vico should be noted. They went to compose the primitive nucleus of the Villa Nova, subsequently called Montis Regalis: today's Mondovì. After 1231 Vico was reduced to the rank of villager and placed under the administration of the Monregalese district, on which it will depend for the entire Middle Ages until the edict of 19 July 1698 by Vittorio Amedeo II of Savoy.

In the sixteenth century, the expansion of Marian devotion was remarkable in Vico, which led to the beginning of the construction of the sanctuary, while in the following century it took an active part in the salt war, during which the rioters occupied and destroyed the local fortress. The revolt resulted in the deportation of a part of the population towards the Vercelli area, the separation of the village from the city on which it depended and its fief, in 1722, to Count Giuseppe Gerolamo Derossi of Usseglio. In 1748 Vico was bought by the Ferrero d'Ormea who kept it until 1796 when the feudal powers declined.

The fact of being in a strategic position brought Vico and the neighbor Mondovì in the interests of Napoleon Bonaparte during his Italian campaign and Vico suffered from reprisals and vandalism. In 1809 the French made Pope Pius VII stay there, a prisoner and directed to Savona.

In the twentieth century, during the last war, Vicoforte paid a considerable toll of lives in the resistance, while in 1994 the flood did various damage also to Vicoforte, also causing a victim.

How to orient yourself

Its municipal territory also includes the villages of Fiamenga, Moline and San Grato.

How to get

By car

• The town is located along the original route of the state road 28 of the Colle di Nava.

On the train

• Vicoforte is served by the Vicoforte-San Michele stop, a former station along the Turin-Savona railway served by regional trains operated by Trenitalia as part of the service contract stipulated with the Piedmont Region.

How to get around

What see

• 44.3666677.851 Sanctuary-Basilica of the Nativity of Mary. More simply known as the Vicoforte Sanctuary: an imposing building built several times between the end of the 16th and the beginning of the 20th century, it boasts the largest elliptical dome in the world. Its construction is due to the devotion brought to a pre-existing pylon, perhaps of the fifteenth century, depicting the Madonna and Child. The construction of the current basilica began with the simple arrangement of that pylon, inadvertently damaged by the shot fired by a hunter, and the building around it of a chapel with thanks for the end of an epidemic.

The first stone of the sanctuary was laid on 7 July 1596, but to reach its final form it will be necessary to wait for its completion only in the 19th century. The external structure includes four corner bell towers and three facades, while inside there are five chapels, one of which houses the remains of Carlo Emanuele I of Savoy, who took the construction of the building very close to heart; in the same chapel in December 2017 the remains of Vittorio Emanuele III and his wife Elena of Montenegro were buried.

In the center stands the altar which incorporates the original pylon (on which the scar due to the shot of the gun is still visible) surmounted by a canopy of 1749 by Francesco Gallo. Since 1880 the sanctuary has been a national monument and in 1935 it was elevated to the rank of minor basilica.  

• Palazzata. It is the name given to the walls of buildings built around the square of the sanctuary, characterized by arcades and symmetrical buildings of equal size, thus framing the sanctuary itself. It was built at different times to a design by the court architect Ascanio Vitozzi, already active in Vicoforte as the author of the Cistercian monastery. 
• Monastery of Santa Chiara. Inaugurated in 1966, it is the modern convent of the Poor Clares, built on a project by the architect Don Carlo Ruffo. 
• Former Cistercian Monastery. Built near the sanctuary, it was built on a project by Ascanio Vitozzi at the behest of Carlo Emanuele I to house the Cistercian monks. Begun in 1601, active from 1613 and completed in 1644, it was richly decorated and equipped with a suspended corridor called wing of royal madam to facilitate the connection with the nearby basilica.

Today the complex is called Casa Regina Montis Regalis, whose premises are used for conferences and prayer meetings, as well as accommodation for pilgrims. 

• Street of the mysteries of the Holy Rosary (Street of the Chapels). Since the seventeenth century it has been traveled by pilgrims who went to pray at the pylon around which the current sanctuary was built. Starting from the second half of the eighteenth century, a series of chapels dedicated to the mysteries of the Rosary were built there, which in the 1869 project of Bishop Ghilardi had to be thirteen plus the sanctuary. Economic difficulties prevented its complete implementation; some were demolished. 
• Parish church of Santi Giovanni e Donato. Of ancient foundation, it underwent a major renovation in the 18th century. Originally intended to be the chapel of the castle, traces of this fact remain in a tower transformed into a bell tower. There are preserved a remarkable Via Crucis, the statues of San Teobaldo and the Madonna della Purità by the artist Roasio, as well as a valuable high altar and a statue of the Immaculate Conception. 
• Parish Church of Saints Peter and Paul (in the locality of Fiamenga). It is mentioned as a parish church in a document dated 1041, making it the oldest religious building in Vicoforte. It preserves precious 15th century frescoes and is probably the church where San Teobaldo Roggeri was baptized in the 12th century. 
• Parish church of San Grato (in the locality of the same name). It was built between 1796 and 1798 to be the suffragan chapel of Santi Giovanni e Donato. It was elevated to a parish in 1952. Inside there is an 18th century canvas depicting Tobias and the archangel Raphael and the sacristy is decorated with stucco. 
• Parish Church of the Annunciation (in the hamlet of Moline). It replaced the older one dedicated to San Benedetto in the locality of Pizzo, which disappeared in the 17th century together with the town probably due to the plague. There are preserved an altarpiece dated 1644 by the Saviglianese Sebastiano Carello and a depiction of the crucifixion with Madonna and Saints, dating back to the second half of the sixteenth century. 

Events and parties

• Sanctuary Fair (Fera 'dla Madona in Piedmontese). in September. It has been going on for about four hundred years. Born thanks to the concomitance of the influx of pilgrims for the feast of the nativity of Mary and the spontaneous organization of local sellers, over time it has become one of the largest fairs in the province of Cuneo. 

What to do

Shopping

How to have fun

Where to eat

Where stay

Safety

How to keep in touch

Post office

• 44.3630987.8641741 Italian post, piazza Carlo Emanuele I, 23, ☎ 39 0174 563124. 

Around

Other projects

• Wikipedia contains an entry concerning Vicoforte
• Commons contains images or other files on Vicoforte

Draft : the article respects the standard template contains useful information for a tourist and gives brief information on the tourist destination. Header and footer are correctly filled out.