Saints Simone and Giuda

Via Guinigi, 32, 55100 Lucca LU

Documented in 839, and again in the 11^th and 12^th century, this church, traditionally called "in Lischia", located by the eastern stretch of the roman walls, was totally renovated in the early 13^th century with a plan of a central nave and two side aisles on pilasters with capitals and an apse, built using square ashlar masonry, alternated with strips of white limestone. The southern door of the façade is the work of Michele Bocaforte, dated to 1258 (as stated by the epigraph in situ). In the 17^th century the interior was covered by vaults, and the church underwent further restoration in 1875. The interior furnishings were conspicuously enriched in the 14^th century. Spinello Aretino painted a polyptych for the altar of saints Jacopo and Filippo that is today divided and conserved in both in Parma and Mexico City. A wooden statue of Saint Ansano, now housed at the archiepiscopal Holy See of Lucca, datable to the second decade of the 15^th century and attributed to Jacopo della Quercia, originally belonged to this church. The high altar features fresco of the Madonna of the Fratta, originally from the 12^th century town walls near the postern of the Fratta, where the Madonna of the Stellario is found today. When the walls were destroyed the image was conserved on a corner of the street, where an oratory was then built but later destroyed in the Napoleonic period. After a brief stay in S. Pier Somaldi, the image was transferred to this church by the wishes of the long-established confraternity of S. Luigi Gonzaga. From 1923 this brotherhood united with the Society of S. Ansano, which had also transferred to this church from S. Sisto.