Abbey of Sant’Emiliano di Congiuntoli

The abbey of S. Emiliano at Congiuntoli stands at the confluence of the Rio Freddo and the river Sentino, along the Scheggia–Sassoferrato road. In early times (that is, from the second half of the 11th century), it was directly linked to Fonte Avellana, to the point that Peter Damian himself sent there as prior St. Dominic Loricatus, “famous for his hermit virtues and his harsh penances”. The first documentary mention of the monastery dates from the year 1110 (in which reference is made to its dedication to St. Benedict) and it is mentioned again, in the year 1143, in a diploma of Pope Celestine II. According to scholars, the first period of settlement would account for the architectural body on which the tower was later built, probably corresponding to the single-nave abbey church (today used as a farm building) with an apse and pointed vaults on pilaster strips. “At an unknown date this space was divided into two floors, creating, on the lower floor, a room with a round barrel vault”. A radical enlargement then led to the demolition of the old apse and the addition of another, wider room, connected to the old area by two octagonal piers. The date of this work can be read in an inscription set into the wall above a single-light window in the wall that overlooks the stream. “On the façade, on the other hand, two dates are carved, 1201 and 1202”, which scholars associate with the construction of this part of the monastic building. This abbey church too stands in a pleasant position, at the confluence of two streams; it is difficult to consider the shrewd choice of location of the complex without linking it to the exploitation of water. The structure is now being restored. The complex, as a whole, shows various interventions. Nothing of the Romanesque structure seems to remain in view. On the outside, the complex of buildings appears, towards the access road, as a fortified structure; the tower stands out, differing in its building methods from the rest of the edifice: the present-day church rises on the left side of the complex (with respect to the approach road), set back from the other massive buildings, and is also built of light-coloured stone, in “proto-Gothic” forms (the few exterior decorations consist of a cornice below the roof of projecting trefoil arches and tall, wide pointed windows opening on the visible side of the church). The interior was heavily altered by the construction, in the 13th century, of a side aisle separated from the presumably older nave, which must have been the only one of the Romanesque building, by two massive polygonal piers of well-squared white stones supporting the cross vaults. The east end has no apse. No trace of a possible crypt.