Pisignano di Cervia, Pieve di Santo Stefano

The Pieve of Pisignano was probably built in the 10th century (the oldest document dates back to 977) on a high dune, on the border of the Roman grid of Cesena. In 1473 Pope Sisto IV gave the pieve, together with its estate, to the Augustinian nuns of the Santissima Annunziata in Venice, also called “of S. Lucia”. In 1512, after the Battle of Ravenna fought between the French and the Spanish, the pieve was destroyed by the scattered troops and then rebuilt by the nuns in 1521. Six years later it was consecrated to the protomartyr saint Stefano: two marble plaques on the façade and in the apse bear witness to these events. In the following centuries the pieve was disfigured by Baroque superstructures and then eventually restored to its original and suggestive Romanic aspect with two interventions (1911-12 and 1979-82) thanks to parsons don Romualdo Turchetti and don Giuseppe Senni and to the Opera of the Superintendence for the Environmental and Architectural Heritage. The latter, in 1993, took the pieve under its care as a building of historic and artistic interest. The name pieve comes from Latin plebs-plebis = people. Today it is surrounded by a park, where a Roman milestone dating back to the 1st century A.C. is placed, and is proudly considered a common heritage of Faith and Art.

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