Tempio Malatestiano

The Malatesta Temple (Italian Malatesta Temple ) is the cathedral of the Italian city of Rimini. Officially, it was initially named after Saint Francis. However, you usually bears the name of Sigismondo Malatesta, who in 1450 commissioned the famous theorist and architect Leon Battista Alberti with a new building, which was decorated by other Renaissance artists like Agostino di Duccio and Piero della Francesca.

History

San Francesco was originally built in the 13th century Gothic church, which belonged to the Franciscans. This church had a square plan, with side chapels was nave and had three apses, the average probably contained frescoes by Giotto, which also includes the crucifix is attributed, which is now right in the second chapel.

Malatesta commissioned Alberti to remodel the building and to build a kind of personal mausoleum for himself and his mistress and later third wife, Isotta degli Atti it. Alberti planned to build a dome to resemble the Pantheon in Rome and throughout Italy that should be largest of its kind that was never built. The upper part of the facade was left unfinished, and the two blind arcades at the side of the entrance, the sarcophagi of Sigismondo Malatesta and Isotta should be placed, which are today located in the interior. Another sarcophagus contains the remains of the philosopher Georgios Gemistos Plethon.

The marble for the church dates from the Roman ruins in Saint Apollinare in Classe at Ravenna and in Fano.