On Sunday, November 15, during the San Martino Fair, the Campedel Association organizes guided tours of the Belluno Cathedral Crypt where the Polyptych of San Martino is preserved.
Entering through the door that leads to the sacristy vestibule, descending all the stairs, one arrives at the crypt. The only altar of undoubted historical-artistic value, reassembled after the damages of the nineteenth-century earthquake, originally constituted the funerary ark of the Avoscano family (third-fourth decade of the 14th century); the central sculpture of the Virgin with the Child and those of the edges that adorn it, instead, are high-stylized integrations dating back to the first quarter of the 15th century. The elegant marble custodian contains the relics venerated in the cathedral since the Middle Ages.
The altarpiece above formed by the polyptych with the stories of San Martino (15th century) is enriched by the predella (events of the life of the Baptist) and the tympanum with the Eternal Father, executed by the Belluno artist Nicolò de Stefani (eighth-ninth decades of the 16th century). On the walls, one can notice some portraits of bishops (two by the 17th-century painter Francesco Frigimelica the Elder) and a polychrome wooden shield by the sculptor Andrea Brustolon (before 1730).
The guided tours, free of charge, will take place in the afternoon every hour: at 2.00 p.m., 3.00 p.m., and 4.00 p.m.
No reservation is required, but it is enough to show up at the chosen time in the crypt, the entrance of which is located at the end of the left aisle by descending the stairs.
