The Basilica della Santa Casa () is a Marian shrine in Loreto, in the Marches, Italy. The basilica is known for enshrining the house in which the Blessed Virgin Mary is believed by some Catholics to have lived. Pious legends claim the same house was flown over by angelic beings from Nazareth to Tersatto (Trsat in Croatia), then to Recanati, before arriving at the current site.
The basilica is also known for enshrining the Madonna and Child image of "Our Lady of Loreto". Pope Benedict XV designated her under this title as patroness of air passengers and auspicious travel on 24 March 1920. Pope Pius XI granted a Canonical Coronation to the venerated image made of Cedar of Lebanon wood on 5 September 1922, replacing the original Marian image consumed in fire on 23 February 1921.
The church
The basilica containing the is a Late Gothic structure built starting from 1468, and continued by Giuliano da Maiano, Giuliano da Sangallo, and Donato Bramante. It is long, wide, and its campanile is high.
The façade of the church was erected under Sixtus V, who in 1586 fortified Loreto and gave it the privileges of a town; his colossal statue stands on the parvis, above the front steps, a third of the way to the left as one enters. Over the principal doorway there is a lifesize bronze statue of the Virgin and Child by Girolamo Lombardo; the three superb bronze doors executed at the latter end of the 16th century under the reign of Paul V (1605–1621) are also by Lombardo (1506–1590), his sons and his pupils, among them Tiburzio Vergelli (1551–1609), who also made the fine bronze font in the interior. The doors and hanging lamps are by the same artists.
The richly decorated campanile (1750 to 1754), by Luigi Vanvitelli, is of great height; the principal bell, presented by Leo X in 1516, weighs 11 tons.
The interior of the church has mosaics by Domenichino and Guido Reni and other works of art, including statues by Raffaello da Montelupo. In the sacristies on each side of the right transept are frescoes, on the right by Melozzo da Forlì, on the left by Luca Signorelli and in both there are some fine intarsias; the basilica as a whole is thus a collaborative work by generations of architects and artists.
The
The main focus of Loreto is the Holy House itself (in Italian, the ). It has been a Catholic pilgrimage destination since at least the 14th century and a popular tourist destination as well.
The House
The House itself consists of three stone walls. It is a plain stone structure, with a door on the north side and a window on the west. The size is (or ) high.
The Black Madonna of Our Lady of Loreto
A niche contains a high image of the Virgin and Child, richly adorned with jewels, above the altar. The statue was commissioned after a fire in the in 1921 destroyed the original Madonna, and it was granted a Canonical Coronation in 1922 by Pope Pius XI.
A legend attributes the original statue of olive wood to Saint Luke, but the style suggests it was created in the 15th century. The original statue, dating back to the 1400s, was an image of the Black Madonna with the Christ Child, both of whom were covered since the 16th century with a jeweled mantle or dalmatic.
The statue was stolen by Napoleonic troops in 1797 and taken to Paris. It was returned with the Treaty of Tolentino and ended up in Rome, from where the image made an eight-day journey as a pilgrim Madonna, arriving in Loreto on 9 December 1801. During the absence of the original statue from the Holy House, a copy made of poplar wood was placed in the niche and remains the only copy to have been venerated in the Holy House. This copy is now enshrined at the Chiesa della Buona Morte in Cannara.
In 1921, a fire broke out inside the Holy House which incinerated the sculpture. At the behest of Pope Pius XI, a new image similar to the original was immediately carved, using the wood of a cedar of Lebanon from the Vatican Gardens. It was modeled by Enrico Quattrini and executed and painted by Leopoldo Celani. In 1922, the statue was crowned in St. Peter's Basilica in the Vatican and transported to Loreto.
There is a local tradition in the city of Treia that the original statue of Our Lady of Loreto was hidden and replaced with a copy before Napoleon's troops looted the basilica. When the copy was returned to Loreto, the exchange with the original statue never took place. Thus, it was the copy that was destroyed by fire. The original statue was hidden in a convent and then taken by Visitandine nuns to Treia, where it is enshrined at the Church of Santa Chiara. Much like the Holy House, it is associated with miracles.