Sant’Angelo alle Fornaci was a small 16th century parish church, now demolished, on the Via Aurelia in the Aurelio quarter.
The dedication was to St Michael the Archangel.
History[]
The first documentary reference to this church is from 1599, when a house next door was given to it. Presumably this was as a dwelling for a priest.
It was in a small industrial suburb along the Via Aurelia, south of St Peter’s, where kilns for making bricks had been set up. Many of the bricks went into the construction of the new St Peter’s. This accounts for the name –Fornaci here means “kilns”.
In 1849, during the defence of Rome against French attack by Giuseppe Garibaldi, this church was destroyed by shellfire. It was not rebuilt, and the nearby convent church of Santa Maria delle Grazie alle Fornaci took over as the parish church. This it remains.
The Via di Porta Cavalleggeri was subsequently built over the site, which is in the roadway just at the present junction with the Via Aurelia.
Location[]
The church was not on the street, but on the other side of a courtyard which served as the parish cemetery. This was on the south side of the Via Aurelia just west of the Porta Fabbrica of the Vatican.
The site is now under the Via di Porta Cavalleggeri. The exact location is under the road at the turnoff to the present Via Aurelia (here a side street) just above the west end of the tunnel of the Lungotevere Vaticano.
Appearance[]
This was a very small church, on an almost square plan and with only one altar. The roof was noted in a 17th century visitation as being low, and the altar as then having an altarpiece showing Our Lady with SS Peter, Paul, Michael and Roch.