Varallo Sesia - Encyclopedia

GEOGRAPHICAL NAMES

VARALLO SESIA, a town of Piedmont, Italy, in the province of Novara, from which it is 34 m. N.N.W. by rail, situated in the valley of the Sesia, 1480 ft. above sea-level. Pop. (1901) 333 0 (town); 4265 (commune). The churches of S Gaudenzio, S Maria delle Grazie and S Maria di Loreto, all contain works by Gaudenzio Ferrari (1471-1546), who was born in the neighbouring Val Duggia, while the Sacro Monte, a place of pilgrimage rising above the town (1995 ft.), is approached by a path leading past forty-five chapels containing groups of life-size painted terra-cotta figures representing scenes from sacred history, with backgrounds in fresco (by Ferrari and others), to the pilgrimage church built by Pellegrino Tibaldi after 1578. In the works mentioned, as Burckhardt remarks, Ferrari's whole development may be traced.