- Religious Tourism
- Art & Culture
Church of San Bernardino alle Ossa
In the heart of Milan, a place full of charm. Thousands of skulls, tibias and other human remains decorate the walls
The Church of San Bernardino alle Ossa was built in the 13th century between Via Brolo (where was the old Hospital of St. Barnabas in Brolo was found) and Verziere, the old fruit and vegetable market.
Next to the church was the ossuary, where those who had died in the nearby hospital were buried.
The church is called "the most Piedmontese of Milan" for its Baroque-Rococo style and was long the seat of the brotherhood of the cheesemakers, as evidenced by a 16th-century painting housed in the church depicting St. Lucius, their protector.
Be sure to note the ossuary chapel decorated with a fresco by Sebastiano Ricci entitled "Triumph of souls in a flight of angels" (1695).
Human bones that once belonged to the sick patients of the neighbouring hospital appear on the walls of the church.
Popular legend has it that on the 2nd of November the bones of a little girl, buried to the left of the altar, come to life, dragging all the skeletons behind her in a sort of dance.
