San Pietro or San Pietro Apostolo is a Neoclassic-style,

Roman Catholic The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics worldwide as of 2025. It is among the world's oldest and largest international institut ...

church located on Piazza Garibaldi in

Parma Parma (; ) is a city in the northern Italian region of Emilia-Romagna known for its architecture, Giuseppe Verdi, music, art, prosciutto (ham), Parmesan, cheese and surrounding countryside. With a population of 198,986 inhabitants as of 2025, ...

History

A church of San Pietro in Parma is first mentioned in the year 955. Tradition holds that it was erected atop the remains of an Ancient Roman temple dedicated to

Jove Jupiter ( or , from Proto-Italic "day, sky" + "father", thus "sky father" Greek: Δίας or Ζεύς), also known as Jove ( nom. and gen. ), is the god of the sky and thunder, and king of the gods in ancient Roman religion and mytholog ...

. It was rebuilt during the 15th century in

Gothic Gothic or Gothics may refer to: People and languages *Goths or Gothic people, a Germanic people **Gothic language, an extinct East Germanic language spoken by the Goths **Gothic alphabet, an alphabet used to write the Gothic language ** Gothic ( ...

-style by Cristoforo Zaneschi. In the early 16th-century papal bull by

Pope Leo X Pope Leo X (; born Giovanni di Lorenzo de' Medici, 11 December 14751 December 1521) was head of the Catholic Church and ruler of the Papal States from 9 March 1513 to his death in December 1521. Born into the prominent political and banking Med ...

describes it as a

collegiate church In Christianity, a collegiate church is a church where the daily office of worship is maintained by a college of canons, a non-monastic or "secular" community of clergy, organised as a self-governing corporate body, headed by a dignitary bearing ...

, Collegio di San Girolamo, with 12 priests. The present church was designed by

Ennemond Alexandre Petitot Ennemond Alexandre Petitot (1727-1801) was a French-born architect, mainly active in the Duchy of Parma. Biography He was born in Lyon in 1727, and by 1741, he had joined the studio of the architect Jacques Soufflot. From there he moved to study ...

, who replaced the prior facade, construction started in 1707 but was not completed till 1762. The façade is decorated with the papal symbols of the tiara, festoons, and keys, in a design by Petitot and modeled in stucco by

Benigno Bossi Benigno Bossi (1727–1792) was an Italian engraver, painter, and stucco artist. Life He was born at Arcisate Giovanni Antonio Vezzani Giovanni may refer to: * Giovanni (name), an Italian male given name and surname * Giovanni (meteorology), a Web interface for users to analyze NASA's gridded data * ''Don Giovanni'', a 1787 opera by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, based on the legend of ...

. The main altar has a canvas depicting the ''Madonna and child and Saints Peter and Paul'' by Alessandro Mazzola. The first chapel on the left has an altarpiece depicting the ''Glory of St Joseph'' by

Alessandro Bernabei Alessandro Bernabei (1580–1630) was an Italian painter of the late-Renaissance or Mannerist period, active in his native Parma. Two of his brothers were painters: his twin, Francesco, and his elder brother Pier Antonio Bernabei, also called D ...

. The second chapel on the left has an altarpiece depicting the ''Virgin in Glory surrounded by the Apostles'' by

Giovanni Bolla Giovanni Bolla (1650 - September 15, 1735) was an Italian painter, active in the Duchy of Parma. He was born and died in Parma, and seem to have developed a style from Carlo Cignani Carlo Cignani (; 15 May 1628 – 8 September 1719) was an Ital ...

.Nuova descrizione della città di Parma
by Paolo Donati; Giuseppe Paganino publisher, Parma (1824); page 91. The church also has a work by

Clemente Ruta Clemente Ruta (9 May 1668 – 11 November 1767) was an Italian painter of the late-Baroque period. Biography Born at Parma, he first trained with a painter by the name of Ilario Spolverini, then later in Bologna with Carlo Cignani. He mo ...

. The church was suppressed by decree of the Napoleonic government in 1811, and reconsecrated in 1852, only to be suppressed again in 1867.

References

{{Authority control

Pietro Pietro is an Italian language, Italian masculine given name. Notable people with the name include: People * Pietro I Candiano (c. 842–887), briefly the 16th Doge of Venice * Pietro Tribuno (died 912), 17th Doge of Venice, from 887 to his dea ...

Roman Catholic churches completed in 1762 Neoclassical architecture in Parma Neoclassical church buildings in Italy