In 1996, during restoration work on the site of a medieval monastery in the ancient city of Alatri in the southern region of Lazio in Italy, a fresco depicting Christ was discovered. It is unique in that nowhere else is there an image of Christ in the center of a huge labyrinth.
Giancarlo Pavat, an Italian labyrinth expert from the Museum of Rome, suggests that Christ is part of the mysterious symbolism of the Templars and points to the sacred path from one cathedral to another. It provides a direction for the pilgrimage of medieval knights in Europe.
Fresco of Christ.
The origin of the city of Alatri is ancient and shrouded in mystery. The city is famous for its triple walls and especially for the acropolis, which is 15 meters high and polygonal in shape, consisting of huge boulders. The acropolis can be accessed through Porta Maggiore (main entrance) and Porta Minore (small gate). The Porta Maggiore Gate is located on the south side of the Acropolis and is 4.5 meters high and 2.68 meters wide.
The Porta Minore Gate is 3.5 meters long. The builders of these ancient walls are unknown, as is the date of construction. Some archaeologists date them to the 6-4th century BC. Others believe they are much older and date back to 1000 BC.
Alatri boasts Roman and medieval monuments, churches and palaces from the 6th, 7th and 8th centuries. The church, built in the 13th century, is dedicated to Saint Francis of Assisi.
During restoration work in 1996, a tunnel with frescoes on the walls was discovered. Unknown artists painted a flower with six petals, the so-called "Flower of Life", spirals, triple circles, mysterious plants and a unique fresco "Christ in Glory", where the Savior is located in the center of a huge maze of 12 concentric black and white circles. The diameter of the outer circle is about 140 cm, and the diameter of the inner circle is 75 cm.
A flower with six petals from the tunnel in Alatri.
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Creating the labyrinth, the artist gave it a cruciform appearance, removing all unnecessary and thinking out the passages so that they look like a cross, which can be seen on the facade of the church of St. Francis of Assisi in Alatri.
Alatri. Porta Maggiore gate.
The wall on which the fresco "Christ in the Labyrinth" is painted faces south. The entrance to the drawn maze is in the west (to the left of the viewer), and the exit is in the east. A person enters from where the sun sets and moves towards the light.
The size of the work and the fact that it sits at the top suggests that it was made to be seen even from a great distance. The fresco was accidentally discovered in the 1990s, before nothing was known about it. The fresco at Alatri is badly damaged, but due to its importance, the Italian government has allocated 100,000 euros for restoration. Today it is open to the public.
Giancarlo Pavat discovered that the Alatri labyrinth was similar in design to the labyrinth located on the floor of Chartres Cathedral in France. In Europe, mainly in Italy, there are more ancient labyrinths in the style of Alatri and Chartres. Some of them are lost, such as the Basilica of San Savino in Piacenza or the Church of San Capracio in Aulla in Tuscany. The labyrinths of the Church of Santa Maria in Akiro and the Basilica of Santa Maria in Trastevere in Rome have also disappeared. Only fragments of some Italian labyrinths in the style of Alatri and Chartres have survived, as in the case of the labyrinth of the Church of San Giovanni Evangelista in Ravenna and the Basilica of San Michele Maggiore in Pavia.
Giancarlo Pavat and the fresco of Christ.
Labyrinths are present in the stone sculptures of the Church of San Pietro in Pontremoli, the Cathedral of San Martino in Lucca (in Tuscany) and the Church of Santa Sinforosa in Abruzzo. Finally, another Chartres-type labyrinth is found in the small medieval church of Greenstad in western Sweden.
It is assumed that all these medieval labyrinths marked the stages of the sacred path, the path of initiation, the path of pilgrimage across Europe, from Scandinavia to England, from France to Italy.
Entrance to the church in Tossichia, Teramo province.
To better understand the main purpose of these puzzles located in sacred places, you need to know who created them. But today it is almost impossible. The study of the artifacts drawn nearby suggests that they are related to the Knights Templar, founded in the second decade of the 12th century in the Holy Land to protect pilgrims and the Holy Sepulcher. The order was destroyed by the French king Philip the Fair with the participation of Pope Clement V in the 14th century.
The Alatri fresco is not the only Italian medieval labyrinth discovered in recent years. Two more have been found in small villages in Abruzzo and Molise. The Abruzzo Labyrinth is located in a pretty village in the Natural National Park of Gran Sasso and Monti della Laga. He is related to the Orsini family, who revealed 34 cardinals and two popes of the Catholic Church to the world - Pope Nicholas III (1277-1280) and Pope Benedict XIII (1724-1730).
Drawn spiral in a tunnel under the monastery of St. Francis of Assisi in Alatri.
Another labyrinth was discovered by engineer Franco Valente in the small town of Colli a Volturno, in the province of Isernia. It belongs to the "Cretan type", but is unique in that a Christian cross is carved in the center. Colli-a-Volturno's labyrinth, carved into the stone built into the outer façade, above, slightly to the right of the entrance to the Church of St. Leonard. The building is located in the historic center of Colli a Volturno and has an entrance to the west and an apse to the east. The exact date of the founding of the church is unknown, but it probably dates back to the seventh and eighth centuries. Just in time for the period when the Knights Templar made their pilgrimage to Jerusalem.
Pavel Romanutenko