San Bernardino alle Ossa is a church in Milan

Milan

Milan is the second-largest city in Italy and the capital city of the region of Lombardy and of the province of Milan. The city proper has a population of about 1.3 million, while its urban area, roughly coinciding with its administrative province and the bordering Province of Monza and Brianza ,...

, northern Italy, best known for its ossuary

Ossuary

An ossuary is a chest, building, well, or site made to serve as the final resting place of human skeletal remains. They are frequently used where burial space is scarce. A body is first buried in a temporary grave, then after some years the skeletal remains are removed and placed in an ossuary...

, a small side chapel decorated with numerous human skulls and bones.
In 1210, when an adjacent cemetery ran out of space, a room was built to hold bones. A church was attached in 1269. Renovated in 1679, it was destroyed by a fire in 1712. A new bigger church was then attached to the older one and dedicated to Saint Bernardino of Siena

Bernardino of Siena

Saint Bernardino of Siena, O.F.M., was an Italian priest, Franciscan missionary, and is a Catholic saint.-Early life:...

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History

The church's origins date to 1145, when a hospital and a cemetery were built in front of the basilica of Santo Stefano Maggiore. In 1210 a chamber was built to house bones from the cemetery, next to which a church was built in 1269. It was restored for the first time in 1679 by Giovanni Andrea Biffi, who modified the façade and decorated the walls of the ossuary with human skulls and tibiae.

The church was destroyed in 1712; it was replaced by a new edifice designed by Carlo Giuseppe Merlo, featuring a central plan and larger size reflecting the increasing popularity of the ossuary. The new church, connected to the former one by an ambulatory

Ambulatory

The ambulatory is the covered passage around a cloister. The term is sometimes applied to the procession way around the east end of a cathedral or large church and behind the high altar....

, was entitled to St. Bernardino of Siena.

The façade was completed in 1776.

Overview

The interior has an octagonal plan, with Baroque-style decorations. The several chapels have paintings from the 16th-18th centuries.

The ossuary's vault was frescoed in 1695 by Sebastiano Ricci

Sebastiano Ricci

Sebastiano Ricci was an Italian painter of the late Baroque school of Venice. About the same age as Piazzetta, and an elder contemporary of Tiepolo, he represents a late version of the vigorous and luminous Cortonesque style of grand manner fresco painting.-Early years:He was born in Belluno, son...

 with a Triumph of Souls and Flying Angels, while in the pendentive

Pendentive

A pendentive is a constructive device permitting the placing of a circular dome over a square room or an elliptical dome over a rectangular room. The pendentives, which are triangular segments of a sphere, taper to points at the bottom and spread at the top to establish the continuous circular or...

s are portrayed the Holy Virgin, St. Ambrose, St. Sebastian and St. Bernardino of Siena. Niches and doors are decorated with bones, in Roccoco style.

In 1738 King John V of Portugal was so struck from the chapel, that had a very similar one built at Évora

Évora

Évora is a municipality in Portugal. It has total area of with a population of 55,619 inhabitants. It is the seat of the Évora District and capital of the Alentejo region. The municipality is composed of 19 civil parishes, and is located in Évora District....

, near Lisbon

Lisbon

Lisbon is the capital city and largest city of Portugal with a population of 545,245 within its administrative limits on a land area of . The urban area of Lisbon extends beyond the administrative city limits with a population of 3 million on an area of , making it the 9th most populous urban...

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