Saint / folklore
St Michael
Background
The Sanctuary of Saint Michael the Archangel is a Roman Catholic shrine on Mount Gargano, Italy, part of the commune of Monte Sant’Angelo, in the province of Foggia, northern Apulia. It has the dignity of a minor basilica.
The cave sanctuary of St Michael at Monte Sant’Angelo, on the Gargano promontory, is one of the oldest and most important shrines in Western Christendom. According to tradition, the archangel appeared there several times from around 490, and the grotto itself is held to have been consecrated by him, not by any bishop. The Lombards adopted it as their national shrine. For a thousand years pilgrims and crusaders on their way to the Holy Land stopped there. Since 2011 it has been part of a UNESCO World Heritage site.
Pilgrims traditionally took home pieces of the cave’s rock, the pietre di San Michele, as protective relics. Some were carved into little figures of the archangel. A fragment of the grotto, kept like a household treasure, was common in southern Italian homes.
In Naples ’44
The cave-sanctuary at Monte Sant’Angelo in Puglia — source of the venerated lump of rock that is, with a royal salver, the one treasured possession in Lattarullo’s bare flat.
Appears in 1 diary entry.
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May 1 1944The onset of summer heat is announced by a street vendor's mournful cry, prompting the city's rhythms to visibly slow down.
cave-sanctuary at Monte Santangelo
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