San Giacomo Maggiore

The Basilica of San Giacomo Maggiore is an historic Roman Catholic church in Bologna, region of Emilia Romagna, Italy, serving a monastery of Augustinian friars. It was built starting in 1267 and houses, among the rest, the Bentivoglio Chapel, featuring numerous Renaissance artworks.

A community of hermits founded by the Blessed John the Good of Modena had established itself near the walls of Bologna, along the Savena river, as early as 1247. They founded a monastery with its church, dedicated to St. James the Greater . The hermits were merged in 1256 by the pope with other eremetical communities of the region to form the Order of Hermits of St. Augustine, with one of their number being elected the first Prior General of the new Order. As they then needed a larger religious complex within the walls, in 1267 construction was undertaken of the new church in the present location. The edifice was finished in 1315, but its consecration took place in 1344, with the completion of the apse section. The church, built in sober Romanesque style , had a single nave with visible trusses and ended with a polygonal apse-chapel and two square chapel.

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