Certosa di Bologna

Certosa of Bologna

Colombario's Hall at La Certosa of Bologna.
Details
Established	1334
Location	Bologna
Country	Italy
Type	Public
Owned by	Bologna
Website	Official website

The Certosa di Bologna is a former Carthusian monastery (or charterhouse) in Bologna, northern Italy, which was founded in 1334 and suppressed in 1797. In 1801 it became the city’s Monumental Cemetery which would be much praised by Byron and others. In 1869 an Etruscan necropolis, which had been in use from the sixth to the third centuries BCE, was discovered here.

The Certosa is located just outside the walls of the city, near the Stadio Renato Dall'Ara, at the foot of the Monte della Guardia and the Sanctuary of the Madonna di San Luca.

The church is dedicated to Saint Jerome (San Girolamo). The painting over the high altar is The Crucifixion by Bartolomeo Cesi; to the left is a Prayer in the Garden of Gethsemane and to the right a Deposition, also by Cesi. The wooden inlaid choir stalls were restored by Biagio De' Marchi in 1538 after a fire started by the Landsknechts of Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor. There is a series of large (450 x 350 cm) paintings of episodes from the life of Christ which were commissioned to Giovanni Andrea Sirani (Christ in the House of Simon, 1652), Elisabetta Sirani (The Baptism of Christ, 1658), Francesco Gessi (The Miraculous Draught of Fishes and The Expulsion from the Temple, 1645), Giovanni Maria Galli da Bibiena (The Ascension, 1651), Lorenzo Pasinelli (Entry into Jerusalem, 1657), Domenico Maria Canuti, and the Neapolitan Nunzio Rossi (Adoration of the Shepherds). There are paintings of several Carthusian martyrs including the Englishmen Blessed William Exmew, Blessed Thomas Johnson, Blessed Richard Bere, and Blessed Thomas Green.