THE CHURCHES

The three-nave hall marked by arcades upon columns, the east-facing apse and the square-plan bell tower, set against the southern side, all refer to the mid-12th century. The interior shows a wooden cover for the nave and a masonry groin vault for the aisles. It is interesting to remark the use of dark-reddish volcanite as building material for the creation of moulded lozenges in the apse, completed by green-coloured tuff insertions. The construction of a two-storey porch set against the façade refers to the 13th century. Its lower part, groin-vaulted, provides an entrance to the church, while the upper section formed the episcopal chapel, directly connected to the bishop’s palace, once set along the southern side of the cathedral and now visible only in a few portions of the foundations.

The diocese of Bisarchium/Guisarchum is confirmed by documents from 1065-82, with the bishops Nicodemus and Gavinus, until 1503, when it was joined to Ottana and Castra dioceses and then moved to Alghero. Thanks to a late-11th-century paper, it is known that the sovereign of Torres Costantino de Lacon and his wife intended to renew a donation already registered in a document that had gone lost ‘cando arserat sa ecclesia de Guisarchu’. Thus, it may be theorized that a church existed in Bisarcio as early as in the 11th century, later destroyed by a fire and then rebuilt starting from the mid-12th century.

The church has got a few notable capitals, mainly featuring vegetal decorations, except for the last one on the left before the presbytery; placed on top of a pier, it is adorned with human figures. Also worth mentioning are the decorations on the lower part of the porch and a special fireplace shaped like a mitre, sited inside the episcopal chapel. 

Throughout the 20th century, since 1958, a series of restoration works led to replace a number of original parts. Yet, the charm of the building is still intact, in its distinguished, plentiful sculptural ornament of the entrance porch.

Roberto Coroneo, Architettura romanica dalla metà del mille al primo ‘300, Nuoro, 1993. Roberto Coroneo, Renata Serra, Sardegna preromanica e romanica, collana “Patrimonio artistico italiano”, Milano, 2004.Roberto Coroneo, Chiese romaniche della Sardegna. Itinerari turistico-culturali, Cagliari, 2005.