Santuario Nostra Signora di Montespineto

The Sanctuary has its origins in a series of events to be found on the border between history and legend. In 1155, the local inhabitants had to escape a plundering conducted by Barbarossa, finding refuge in the mountains where they begged the Virgin Mary to save them and built a chapel in her honour. At the beginning of the 1600s, Stazzano was invaded by an enemy force and once more the local people found refuge in the remains of the old chapel over which a dove flew for days on end and then, settling on a whitethorn bush, gave the power of speech back to a young mute girl. Bearing in mind the vast numbers of pilgrims, the Bishop of Tortona decided to build the current Sanctuary constructed between 1623 and 1630, with an arch being added in 1840; the façade, with its current sober neoclassical lines, dates to 1866. Inside there are three naves with three altars where there is a marble statue of the Virgin with Child from 1629. From the churchyard next to the Sanctuary there is a marvellous view which extends from the Plain of Lombardy to the Alps.