Collegiata di San Medardo

The Collegiata di San Medardo is first of all a working church, the collegiate church of Arcevia, a hill town in the Marche inland from Senigallia. It is also a church-museum, because the paintings made for it centuries ago are still here.

The largest is Luca Signorelli's polyptych, commissioned by the town on 17 June 1507 with the backing of the bishop of Senigallia and paid off a year later. Almost four metres tall, it shows the Madonna and Child enthroned among saints, and Signorelli signed it below the Virgin's feet. The town was pleased enough to ask him for more, and his Baptism of Christ of 1508 is in the same church.

There is also a large glazed terracotta altarpiece by Giovanni della Robbia, from the Florentine workshop famous for that technique, with the Madonna between Saint John the Baptist and Saint Jerome. The church is documented as early as 1208 and was rebuilt between 1634 and 1644, and its small parish museum opens by appointment.