Sanctuary of Santa Maria della Mentorella

The sanctuary stands on a cliff overlooking the Giovenzano valley, in the Guadagnolo area, in the municipality of Capranica Prenestina. The scant information available on its origins makes it impossible to determine when it was founded and to reconstruct its early construction phases with any certainty. The sanctuary stands on a cliff overlooking the Giovenzano Valley, in the locality of Guadagnolo within the municipality of Capranica Prenestina, Italy. Due to the scarcity of historical sources, the exact date of its foundation and the earliest phases of construction remain uncertain. Various legends surround the site: according to tradition, the church was built by Constantine and consecrated by Pope Sylvester I at the place where the miracle of Saint Eustace occurred. The nearby cave behind the church, associated with the saint, is also said to have hosted Saint Benedict before his retreat to Subiaco, who allegedly restored the church and founded a monastic community that remained there until the late fourteenth century. The earliest documented evidence of the sanctuary dates to a diploma issued by Pope John XII in 958. In 984 it was granted to the Benedictine monastery of Saints Andrew and Gregory on the Clivus Scauri in Rome, later passing under the control of the feudal lords of Poli together with the surrounding territory. At the beginning of the thirteenth century, under the initiative of Claro, bishop of Tivoli, the sanctuary was expanded. In later centuries, however, it was abandoned and was found in ruins by the Jesuit Athanasius Kircher in 1661. Kircher promoted restoration works, revived the cult, and built a guesthouse with fifteen rooms as well as a long staircase leading to a chapel dedicated to Saint Eustace at the summit of the cliff. In 1857 Pope Pius IX entrusted the sanctuary to the Congregation of the Resurrection, which enlarged the convent and restored the wall paintings that had previously been covered with whitewash; an inscription records the expansion in 1899. The church has a three-nave layout with square pillars supporting pointed arches and is decorated with frescoes dating from the fifteenth, seventeenth, and nineteenth centuries.