Stampa

 

When the edict of the emperor of Rome Costantino allowed the Christians the public exercise of the sacred cult, this church that dates back to the year 313, was Cathedral for well 770 years, that is until to the arrival of the Normanni. The first bishop was the catanian S. Everio, that, having ruled the church of Catania in the 262, there he had built secretly and consecrated between the ruins of the Pretorio (the palace of the Roman preconsul was so called, manufactured beside the church of the S. Jail) a crypt or aedicule where the relics of S. Agatha were preserved, removed from the ancient small church of S. Leo (today disappeared). Toward the 776, S. Leone the thaumaturgist, bishop of Catania, reconstructed, or at least widened in a better form, the ancient church of S. Agata la Vetere, from which Giorgio Maniace, mitted by the Byzantine emperor Michael IV to riconquer Sicily, that from the 975 had been invaded from the Saracens, leaving again from Catania in the 1040, removed the sacred relics of S. Agatha after 788 years, and transport them in the church of S. Sofia in Constantinople. In the time in which the mentioned relics remained in the church of S.Agata la Vetere the believers' veneration never came less. Pilgrims, famous characters for titles or holiness, not excluded the Pope Vigilio, came to bow to the sepulchre of S. Agatha. Also the proud Belisario, when toward the 536 took off Catania to the Goti, reverent bowed to the sepulchre. Richard Lionheart, king of England, in trip to the Palestina, in the 1091, also came to bow to the grave of S. Agatha and worship the sacred relics, offering his jewel diadem in gemmated gold in gift to the saint, of which today the statue is adorned, and in the 1135 came true the miraculous pilgrimage of S. Silvestre Basiliano and of other many notable characters, such as the ancient kings and viceroys of Sicily, leaving as perennial memory of their visit and devotion precious gifts. In a short period of the century XI, the Episcopalian desk was transported by the bishop Ansgerio in the new cathedral erected by the Count Ruggero, Norman, from the 1088 to the 1091. In the second half of the century XIV the bishop Marziale erected the church of S. Agata la Vetere in Priorato, endowing it of many goods, and he gave it in commend to the PP. Benedettini, at that time canonicals of the Cathedral. It is thought that the Minor Observants had been introduced in Catania by S. Bernardino from Siena, and according to other, by a disciple of his in the 1465. They occupied the place where in origin the Reformed stayed, that is in S.M. of Jesus. In the 1605 the mentioned church was granted to the PP. Cappuccini by the Chapter of the Cathedral, and however they did not occupy it. In the 1613, because of the demand of the bishop Bonaventura Secusio, the mentioned church was given to the Minor Observant, to which family he belonged and of wich he had already been general Minister of the order; and, at his own expense, the attached convent was built, in which, after five years, he stops living and it was buried in the Cathedral between the doors of the chapel of the SS. Crucifix and of the sacristy. The earthquake of the 11 January 1693 destroyed also the foundations convent and of the church, that soon were rebuilt in a new different form. The other earthquake of the 1818 ruined the voult that was therefore remade, but, unfortunately, also now it needs other reparations. The ex convent is today occupied by the Faculty of Law. The temple, that has a nave long m. 47.90 and wide about m. 14, belongs to the Regular. It rises in the the little square, that has the same name, with the prospectus in simple masonry turned toward the sunset with a door and a coat of arms on the pediment damaged however by a lightning and unrecognizable, but it brought the insignias of S. Francis From Assisi. Crossed the door we can see 6 waxen that go in procession in city during the feast of S. Agata, in the hallway, a wooden revolving door with golden gratings and a two-headed engraven eagle (coat of arms of the bishop Pietro Galletti). Visiting the temple from the right to the left they are to be observed with the following order:

 

1) A beautiful mausoleum with the bust of the dead person, due to the chisel of the Catanian knight Antonio Calì, dead in Naples.

We read the following epitaph:

MARIO MUSUMECI
ARCHITECTONICES ANTECESSORI
IN REBUS ARCHEOLOGICIS AC HISTORICIS
PRAE ALIIS VERSATO
JOENIAE ACADEMIAE INTER COETEROS FUNDATORI
OPTUME DE PATRIA AC DE DOMO MERITO
CORDIS COMITATE INSIGNI
FILIAE LUGENTES POSUERE
A. D. MDCCCLIV.

(To Mario Musumeci teacher of architecture, turned mainly in the archaeological and historical sciences, founder within others of the Gioenia Academy, dear to the country and to the family, the crying daughters, with big pity in the year of God 1854 set.

2) The first altar with a big painting on cloth, representing the Lady of the Maternity, and another small cloth with the images of the SS. Cardinal Bonaventura, Ludovico bishop of Tolosa (similar to the big picture existing in the church of S. Francis from Assisi, southern aisle).

3) A deep vain under which is an ark with the following inscription dictated by Mons. D. Francis Castro:

IN THIS ANCIENT ARK
FOR MORE OF FIVE CENTURIES THE VENERABLE RELICS
OF OUR FELLOW CITIZEN
S. AGATHA WERE PRESERVED
TODAY IN THE PRECIOUS ARTISTIC JEWEL CASE
RENOVATED
DEVOTLY REPOSED
MDCCCLXXXIX.

 

4) The second altar is adorned by a big painting of Paolo Ferro Vaccaro, of the 1851, in which it is portrayed the Lady of the Angels.

5) The third altar, with an other big painting of the Pennisi, representing S. Agata in the jail with the cut breasts and with S. Pietro and an angel taking an alight torch. We can also see an other small picture that represent S. Lucia. In the February 4 the body in wax of S. Agata, lying inside an urn of glass, is visible in this altar .

A walled headstone, on the wall near to the cited altar, brings the following registration unfortunately worthy of mention:

CALCULATION TO THE DEVOTEES OF THE SAINT.
S. AGATHA WAS BORN IN CATANIA IN THE YEAR 238
SHE WAS CROWNED OF THE MARTYRDOM IN THE YEAR 252
THE FIRST MIRACLE THAT FREED FROM THE FIRE CITY AND SUBURBS
BY THE VEIL, IT WAS THE YEAR 253.
HER BODY REMAINED IN S. AGATA LA VETRA FOR 788 YEARS
SHE WAS TRANSPORTED FROM CATANIA TO CONSTANTINOPLE
IN THE YEAR 1040.
REMAINED IN CONSTANTINOPLE FOR 86 YEARS.
SHE GOES BACK FROM CONSTANTINOPLE TO CATANIA IN THE YEAR 1126.
SHE RESTS IN HER MAJESTIC BASILICA ERECTED BY RUGGIERO
SINCE THE YEAR 1004 UNTIL THE PRESENT.

 

6)The big apse on the oval arc in which there is an eagle in chalk with this registration:

HIC OLIM CONDITA
NVNC COELOCORONATUR.
A. D. MDCCCXXIII

(Once here buried, now she has been crowned in paradise. The year of God 1823).

 

Under the greatest altar it is set a sarcophagus of stone, of Roman execution, adorned of figures and found during the excavations performed in the north and in the east of the city. The body of S. Agata stayed in it during the transport towards Constantinople. The siracusan virgin Lucia went to this sepulchre to ask S. Agata the recovery of her mother, and so it is in memory of this fact that in the church of S. Agata La Vetere is celebrated with great solemnity, on December 13, the feast of the glorious siracusan martyr. Set to the northern wall of the apse we can see two tables in stone, the nearest of whom has aloft a registration in 3 lines in marmoreal letters graven in relief, of ancient Gothic form, with these words:

MENTEM SANCTAM SPONTNEAM
HONOREM DEO ET PATRIAE
LIBERATOREM.


(Holy spontaneous Mind, honor to God and liberation of the country)
Lower they are engraved in Roman letters the words:


HIC INVETA FVIT DIE 18 IVLIJs AN.° 1742.


(Here this headstone was found the day July 18 in the year 1742)
Still lower, among a stony bas-relief that represents S. Agata in the jail with S. Pietro, we can see paleografic characters graven in ancient Gothic and rather corroded and unrecognizable, this other inscription: (it is a dialogue between S. Agata and S. Pietro).

QUIS ES TU, QUI VENISTI AD ME CURARE VULNERA MEA?
EGO SUM APOSTOLUS CHRISTI: NIHILIN ME DUBITES.
FILIA: IPSE ME MISIT AD TE, QUEM DILEXISTI MENTE.
ET PURO CORDE.

MEDICINAM CARNALEM CORPORI MEO NUMQUAM EXHIBUI.
SED HABEO DOMINUM IESUM CHRISTUM, QUI SOLO.
SERMONE RESTAURAT UNIVERSA.

(Who are you, that are come to me to take care of my plagues? I am the apostle of Christ. Do not doubt of me, oh daughter: He has sent me to you that have loved him with the mind and with the pure heart).
(I have never turned carnal medicine for my body, but I have the Lord Jesus Christ, who refreshes every thing with only the word).
The second chart not too far from the first one brings aloft the words:


IMPIE, CRUDELIS, ET DIRE TYRANNE, NON ES CONFUSUS
AMPUTARE IN FEMINA QUOD IPSE IN MATRE SUXISTI?


(Cruel, impious and inhuman tyrant, are you not ashamed to cut in woman what also you have sucked in your own mother?).
Under the named inscription there is another marmoreal tablet with two graven breasts and lower we can finally read:

D.O.M.
HIC QUINTIANA IMPIETAS QUOD IN
IN MATRE CLEMENTER SUXIT I AGATHA
CRUDELITER AMPUTAVIT
ANN. D.O.M. CCLII.


(Here the impiety of Quinziano cruelly cut in Agata what it serenely sucked in his mother. In the year of the Lord Ottimo Massimo 252).