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Romanesque Church of San Francesco: the funerary monument where the Counts of Anguillara rest
In the historic centre of Capranica, 30 km from Viterbo along the Via Cassia, the Romanesque church of San Francesco (St Francis) is one of the most important monuments of southern Tuscia. Built in the 13th century and originally dedicated to St Lawrence, it passed on to the Franciscans around 1400, and was renamed. Today it is deconsecrated, and hosts cultural events, but retains its austere charm: three naves divided by columns in peperino stone, a roof with wooden tie-beam trusses, and unadorned walls in light-coloured tufa.
The tomb of the twin counts
At the far end of the presbytery stands the funerary monument of Francesco and Nicola Anguillara, the twin counts who donated the church to the friars. Dying just two years apart — the former in 1406, the latter in 1408 — they are depicted together in armour, recumbent on a sarcophagus beneath a Gothic baldachin, with curtains drawn aside by angels. The work, attributed to the sculptor Paolo da Gualdo Cattaneo, is a masterpiece of late Gothic funerary sculpture. At the top, the Virgin Mary and Child watch over the deceased.
The frescoes and possible attribution to Michelangelo
Frescoes from the 14th and 15th centuries can still be seen today. One in particular, Sant'Antonio da Padova tra San Sebastiano e San Rocco (Saint Anthony of Padua between Saint Sebastian and Saint Roch), has been attributed by some scholars to the young Michelangelo or his circle. The fresco depicting Saints Terenziano, Roch and Sebastian has definitely been attributed to Antonio del Massaro, known as il Pastura.
