Church of San Pietro

Cultural Site

From time immemorial there was on the “Tabor” a chapel that became a church, then a temple, surmounted in the XVIII century, by a dome, and dedicated to the Apostle Peter. From medieval documents it appears to be the church of San Pietro in Vico already famous at the time of the Normans. Many donations were made to this church which is named in a Brief by Pope Alexander III of 1167; in the conference proceedings of Clement III of 7.10.1197. In 1264, with land and housing, it was granted in emphyteusis to the judge Gualtieri. The church with its holdings was also “Grancia” of the monastery of San Leonardo di Siponto which, for many centuries, belonged to the Teutonic Order (later of the Knights of Malta). The church was transformed, with adjoining land, into an extra-moenia cemetery by the Vichian canon D. Pietro Finis in the year 1792 (inauguration date). It was the third cemetery of Italy to be established outside the walls of a city (after those of Pisa and Naples) thus allowing the use of burying in churches to be abandoned. The Cemetery went out of use, with time, and, having fallen into disrepair, the church (which was semi-ruined by meteorological events) this was recently (1979-71) restored to pristine with a vast reintegrative restoration that tried to reproduce the original form and keep what still exists. The works carried out by the RR.PP. Cappuccinos were half-funded with funds from the Ministry of Public Education, under the high surveillance of the Monuments Office of Bari.On the hill where the Church stands were found, at the time of the construction of the modern Institute of St. Peter, important finds of ancient tombs including the skeleton of a warrior of considerable proportions.