Museu The church of Saint Nicholas - San Paolo di Civitate (FG)

The church dedicated to St. Nicholas Bishop, with an original structure dating from the early seventeenth century, is one of the oldest places of worship in the city center.
After Civitate was abandoned, several Greek and Albanian families settled in the hamlet of San Paolo. They quickly felt the need to build a church for the Byzantine rite, within the walls (because the previous church of Sanctus Paulus Graecorum was left outside the walls). When building the temple, they also reused materials taken from Teanum Apulum-Civitate. In fact, the sculptural panels, in limestone, still displayed on the facade, are made of a tombstone with two Roman busts and two bas-reliefs, one of which from late antiquity depicting St. George and the medieval one with the effigy of a lion. Lucchino in 1630 described the collapse of the building during the earthquake of 1627. Two centuries later Fraccacreta gave us a rough idea of the appearance of the church during the eighteenth century, described as a building small in size, with only two “stained glass windows” on the sides and oriented along an axis perpendicular to the current one.
In 1801 the Confraternity of the Holy Rosary, who managed the church, believing that the building was no longer big enough for religious services, began a complete reconstruction. The rector of the Confraternity Michele Magnati (following fulfilment of a vow) worked for the completion of the reconstruction (done in 1804), as evidenced by the inscription on the stone in Latin above the portal. The nineteenth-century building, which we see today, is influenced by Baroque and has an elliptical plan with a single nave (enriched by altars with niches dedicated to various saints) confined in an external rectangular perimeter in line with the urban streets. The presbytery area, slightly elevated and separated from the hall by a cast-iron balustrade, is laterally connected with the two lateral choirs covered with cross vault. In addition, it connects through a door with a back room, used as a vestry where you can notice the old brick floor.
Between 1934 and 1935 major renovation involved both the interior, with painted decorations by Vittorio Rotelli and grit paving in the hall, and exterior with building work carried out by the local master builder Antonio Urbano. This concerned repairing and replacing the majolica tiles on the bell tower, roofs and windows, as well as work to repaint the external facing on which traces of Pompeian red are still visible.
Since the sixties maintenance work has decreased, with the building gradually decaying, marked by natural disasters. On June 13th 1989 lightning struck causing a gash in the top of the tower. In 1998 the Mayor declared the church inaccessible and it was closed for worship. Fenced in due to danger of collapse, the church was shored up with some safety measures the day after the tragic earthquake of 31 October 2002 which led to the creation of numerous cracks in already damaged walls. In addition, for over ten years, the infiltration of rainwater, (especially through gaps in roofing due to the partial collapse of dilapidated wooden structures), has further deteriorated the walls and painted surfaces.
Thanks to the initiative of the Pro Church Committee of St. Nicholas and the extraordinary mobilization of the population, for whom the church of St. Nicholas has always been an important place of cultural and religious identification, its value emerged. In 2012 it was ranked second in the Census "I luoghi del cuore", promoted by FAI with Intesa Sanpaolo. With this result, the church received a grant to restore the facade, consisting in: localised intervention to consolidate and restore, clean and protect the brickwork and stone elements against water, preserve traces of plaster and of copper details. All the windows and doors were also replaced. This resulted in the subsequent allocation of P.O. FESR Puglia 2007-2013 funds by the Region of Puglia, thanks to which the parish of St. Anthony started in 2015 the recent consolidation work: replacement of roofs with the recovery of original roof tiles, restoration of the external facing and installation of new fittings. Additional contributions were offered by the Diocese of San Severo and donations by citizens through the Pro Loco Civitas and the City of San Paolo di Civitate.