Santi Sergio E Bacco - 18th Century

18th Century

In 1718 an icon of Madonna and child is said to have been discovered under the plaster of a wall in the adjacent sacristy building and the next year it was removed and installed above the main altar of Sts. Sergius and Bacchus at the order of Pope Clement XI (1700–21). The icon is a copy of an icon venerated at a Marian shrine in Zyrowice, a town now in Belarus, known as Our Lady of Zyrowice or Our Lady of the Pasture. That icon is said to have miraculously descended from the heavens in 1480 in the sight of a group of shepherds pasturing their animals. Sts. Sergius and Bacchus in Rome has thereafter also been called Madonna del Pascolo (Madonna of the Pasture).

After initial design by Francesco Ferrari in the first years of the 18th century, reconstruction and redecoration of the church was undertaken from 1741 in honor of the image of the Madonna and the interior received the appearance it has today. Behind a modern wrought iron iconostasis, the high altar is set off by two fluted columns of verde antico marble with bronze Corinthian capitals designed by Filippo Barigioni (1690 –1753), a Roman artist who did other projects for Clement XI. On either side of the main altar are paintings by the Bavarian Ignazio Stern (1680-1748), one of Sts. Sergius and Bacchus and one of St. Basil. On the ceiling is an Assumption, including Sts. Sergius and Bacchus in glory, by Sebastiano Ceccarini (Italian, 1703-1783).

Romanian Greek Catholic Inocenţiu Micu-Klein, Bishop of Blaj, died in Rome September 23, 1768, was buried at Santi Sergio e Bacco, and was remembered by memorial plaques in the church in Latin and Romanian. His remains rested there until 1997 when they were transferred to Holy Trinity Cathedral in Blaj, as he had wished.

Jordan Mickiewicz, superior of the Ruthenian monks of St. Basil, in 1819 recorded by inscription that Pope Pius VII (1800–23) in 1801 solemnly venerated the Madonna del Pascolo, which Clement XI had installed here.