Explorer Assise

The Temple of Minerva is a Roman temple on Assisi's Piazza del Comune, built in the 1st century BC, whose portico of six fluted Corinthian columns still stands. In the Middle Ages it served the commune as a seat, a court and a prison; since 1539 it has housed the church of Santa Maria sopra Minerva, redecorated in Baroque style in the 17th century.

Santa Maria Maggiore is a Romanesque church in Assisi beside the bishop's palace where Francis renounced his possessions, which gives it its other name, the Sanctuary of the Spoliation. The present church dates from the 11th and 12th centuries over a Roman house, and since 2019 it holds the tomb of Saint Carlo Acutis.

Assisi Cathedral is dedicated to Rufinus, the town's martyred first bishop, and was begun in 1140 to designs by Giovanni da Gubbio. Its Romanesque facade carries three rose windows; the interior was remodelled by Galeazzo Alessi from 1571. Francis and Clare were both baptised here, and the crypt and diocesan museum show the earlier churches below.

The Basilica of Saint Clare is a Gothic church in Assisi built in the 1250s and 1260s to hold the remains of Clare, the founder of the Poor Clares, which lie in its crypt. Its facade of pink and white Subasio stone has a large rose window, wide buttress arches brace its flank, and inside hangs the San Damiano crucifix.

The Basilica of Saint Francis of Assisi is the mother church of the Conventual Franciscans, begun in 1228, two years after the saint's death. Built into the hillside with its friary, it has a Lower and an Upper Church above a crypt with his tomb, and frescoes by Cimabue, Giotto, Simone Martini and Pietro Lorenzetti.

San Damiano is a 12th-century church and convent among olive groves below the walls of Assisi, where Franciscan tradition places the crucifix that spoke to Francis in 1205. Clare of Assisi founded the Poor Clares here and lived in the convent until her death in 1253; visitors see the small church, Clare's choir and the cloister.