Church of Saint Michael of Salvennor

The Church of Saint Michael is located a short distance from Ploaghe, along the Sassari-Olbia road. It is one of the most meaningful examples of Romanesque monastery architecture. In 1908 it was declared a national monument. It rises majestically over a beautiful plain in the countryside of Salvennero, named after the nearby village abandoned during the second half of the 18th century. It has appeared in documents since 1138 and was the church of the abbey of the Benedictine religious order of Vallombrosa. It dates back to the age of the Judgedom of Torres (tn* one of four Sardinian medieval kingdoms, called Judgedoms or Judicatures: independent states that took power in Sardinia in the Middle Ages, between the 9th and 15th century AD) and it is believed to have been founded by Mariano I (tn* Mariano I of the Lacon-Zori family, Judge-King of the Judgedom of Arborea from 1060 to 1070) and then renovated by the monks of Villombrosa. The plan has a T-shape with three apses, the man body of the church has a wooden roof, while the arms of the transept have cross vaults. The church was built in two stages, one dating back to the end of the 11th century and the other to the first quarter of the 13th century. The parts built during the first stage are the limestone walls and the medium-sized ashlars, the apses of the transept and the façade. While, the parts built during the second stage are the walls in limestone and basalt, the pediments and the sacristy, installed inside the lower chamber of the bell tower, which had already collapsed in the first half of the 15th century. On the northern side, there is a rustic building of modern workmanship, connected to the church by a round arch. On the façade there are evident signs of a portico, demolished in the second half of the 1800s, together with the already crumbling monastery. In an unidentified position there was once a Holy Door, of which only the opening ceremony remains. The footprints and signs of the ancient pilgrims sketched in the apses are proof of the spirituality of the time. The monks of Vallombrosa left Salvennero in the first half of the 15th century. After a brief period of time in the hands of the Order of Friars Minor of Sardinia, the church was handed over to the jurisdiction of the parish of Ploaghe in the first half of the 1600s.
At the moment, the church is included in the territorial plan of the renovation and restoration project “Coros Anglona, Terre di tradizione”, organised by the Union of the Towns of Coros. The proposal involves renovation work at some of the rural churches present in the territory of Coros and Anglona, aiming to give them touristic value, and create a network of cultural and environmental sites. In fact, in the territory there are many places of worship of elevated historical and cultural value, which with some effort, can activate a virtuous process of attracting many tourists, including from Sardinia. As in the case of the renovation of Saint Michael’s church, included in the programme “Sardinia in a hundred churches”, for which a special agreement was made between the Region of Sardinia and the Sardinian Episcopal Conference. The conservative renovation aims to eliminate all the elements of neglect and deterioration, such as alveolation and chips in the stones, vegetation, efflorescence and erosion, as well as checking and improving the structural integrity of the building. There is also the plan to install external information panels.

Source: website of the Town Council of Ploaghe; book “Churches and institutions of Ploaghe” (in Italian), by Gavino Spanedda