Photo: Parma1983 · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Wikimedia Commons

Museo del tesoro del Duomo di Berceto

Small museum in the chapel of Sant’Apollonia in the Cathedral of San Moderanno, with the cope of Saint Moderanno and a rare early medieval glass chalice.

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Directions

About the museum

The museum is housed in the 18th-century chapel of Sant’Apollonia, which originally probably housed the baptistery of the Cathedral of San Moderanno in Berceto, on the Via Romea. Its display cases hold objects that reached the church over the centuries because of the importance of the site.

The Cathedral, in Romanesque forms, stands on a church documented already at the beginning of the 8th century; according to tradition, Bishop Moderanno of Rennes brought relics from Reims in 718. In the 11th century the church became a parish church (pieve) dedicated to San Moderanno, and in the late 12th century it was rebuilt in the Romanesque style.

Among the pieces on display are the cope of San Moderanno, in silk from Lucca, perhaps of the 12th century and linked by tradition to the saint, and a very thin glass chalice with iridescent reflections, found in 1971 beneath the presbytery in an anonymous tomb predating the 11th century. It is the rarest piece in the museum.

Highlights

Cope of San Moderanno in Lucca silk, perhaps 12th century
Early medieval glass chalice found in 1971
18th-century chapel of Sant’Apollonia
Romanesque cathedral on the Via Romea