San Pietro Consavia Complex

The Church of San Pietro in Consavia, or Baptistry of San Pietro, is a Catholic Church of Asti, consisting of four buildings dating from 12th century and 14th century located at the eastern end of Corso Alfieri in Borgo San Pietro.
The Priory Church, square, was built in Renaissance forms from Giorgio Valperga, Prior of Lombardy, with beautiful Terra-cotta decorations, frescoes from the 17th century and romantic cloister.

The octagonal Romanesque Baptistry dating from the 10th-12th centuries was built in imitation of the Holy Sepulchre of Jerusalem by the Order of Knights of St. John of Jerusalem then of Rhodes, then of Malta (Templars) using the complex to accommodate the pilgrims of the Via Francigena.

It was the Bishop Landolfo di Vergiate after the year 1000 to begin the construction of the first nucleus, which copy of the holy place, for all those who don't have the means to travel to Palestine and could then follow a local pilgrimage. Between the 13th and 14th centuries, in the period of greatest expansion of the municipality, there was also the developement of the three church buildings, disposed to “U” to the side of the religious building, forming an inner court. In the 15th century there was a new extension of the complex with the addition of a square building on the East side.
At the center of the Rotunda there is a marble baptismal font of sixteenth-century style at which, on the opposite side of the entrance, you access the adjacent square Hall. Remarkable pottery depicting human figures, plants and symbolic objects, adorning the Windows and ceiling rose.

The sixteenth and seventeenth century, saw a significant deterioration of the structure in later wars, Marquess of Montferrat. In the following centuries the complex underwent several restorations: in 1798, with the Suppression of Jerusalemite, the Church came under the ecclesiastical jurisdiction and between the late 1700s and early 1800s, lost its distinctive architecture with revisions and addition of the façade facing the via maestra.

The complex of the Baptistry of St. Pietro primarily consists of three buildings: the fifteenth-century square Church, the adjoining Rotunda with its Tower from the middle of the 12th century and the nearby cloister (of which a portion was destined to pilgrims ' hospital) and a home Priory, that currently is home to the Archaeological Museum of Asti.
The Rotunda of the Holy Sepulchre is a brick and sandstone building,typical monferrina; the inside perimeter, circular, consists of eight columns, linked by arches, the outer perimeter is polygonal. The central dome, rests on an octagonal drum. The lintel and the arches of the Rotunda, feature stone friezes of sandstone dating back to the 12th century. The former are figured with Zoomorphic images, the seconds are Cornucopias or vegetable decoration items.

The square room, willed by prior Giorgio Valperga in the 15th century, presents rich terracotta friezes to double arched window frames and shelves of acute ribs cruises. Become are depicted and Zoomorphic heads, representing the highest point reached by the manufacture of earthenware in Asti in the 14th century.

In some rooms of the upper floor exposes many archaeological finds of all sources ranging from Egyptian objects, the Greek pottery until Roman and barbarian archaeological material.