Church of the Madonna della Neve

This church is located close to the Carrarese walls, at a gate-tower, which originally allowed access from the village to the last stretch of the ancient road, which led to the fortress, known as “Porta della Castagnera”.

With the end of the Carrarese dominion and the submission to Venice, at the end of the XIV century, the strategic and military importance of Conegliano was less and with it, the defensive function of the fortified system, for which the space of the tower had been equipped with a fresco icon of the Madonna del latte. Less than a century later, perhaps due to the strong devotion to that image, the real oratory had to arise.

The dedication to the Madonna della Neve dates back to the mid-seventeenth century and proclaims the passage of the oratory from an exclusive place of prayer for the aristocracy of Conegliano to an oratory of the people. The veneration towards the Madonna della Neve draws its origins from the dedication to the basilica of Santa Maria Maggiore in Rome, in remembrance of the late medieval legend regarding the snowfall of August 5th on Mount Esquilino.

The current building, the result of an important restoration in 1992 by the local Alpini section, substantially maintains the aspect assumed in the eighteenth century.
Inside on the left side of the vestibule there is an arch and its capital. Then there is a quadrangular classroom that corresponds with the space held by the fourteenth-century tower, within which the aforementioned figure of the Madonna del latte, attributed to Giovanni Antonio da Meschio completed shortly after the mid-fifteenth century. Subsequently the painter from Conegliano Francesco Beccaruzzi enhanced its surroundings with the execution of the row of musical Angels and two Angels. In the room that serves as a presbytery, on the altar, is preserved the statue of the Madonna with Child.