Tabernacolo della Madonna della Tosse, Gothic Revival edifice in Castelfiorentino, Italy.
The Tabernacolo della Madonna della Tosse is a shrine featuring pointed arches, intricate stonework, and vertical lines that draw the eye upward. The facade displays the characteristic vocabulary of Late Gothic architecture with careful attention to carved details.
The masonry tabernacle dates to 1484, when Benozzo Gozzoli and his workshop frescoed it for Messer Grazia da Castelnuovo, prior of Santa Maria Assunta at Castelnuovo d'Elsa, as an inscription on its front records. A 1576 apostolic visit notes the Societas B.V.M. Annunciatae processed there monthly. In 1853 it was enclosed in a Gothic Revival chapel and turned into an oratory to shelter the paintings; these were detached in the 1970s and moved to the BEGO museum, opened 30 January 2009.
The name "della Tosse" refers to coughs, and the shrine was a destination for devotion linked to that ailment. A 1576 apostolic visitation records that the Societas B.V.M. Annunciatae, based at Santa Maria Assunta in Castelnuovo d'Elsa, walked down to the oratory in procession every month. The painted surface was detached in the 1970s and reassembled with Gozzoli's Tabernacle of the Visitation at the BEGO-Museo Benozzo Gozzoli, inaugurated on 30 January 2009.
The shrine stands on the road from Castelfiorentino to Castelnuovo d'Elsa, outside the town centre, so it is reached by that country road rather than from the main square. The 1484 frescoes are no longer here: they are shown at the BEGO-Museo Benozzo Gozzoli, via Testaferrata, in Castelfiorentino's historic centre, open since 30 January 2009.
The 1484 frescoes were detached in the 1970s and reassembled with those of the Tabernacle of the Visitation in the BEGO-Museo Benozzo Gozzoli, opened on 30 January 2009 in via Testaferrata in Castelfiorentino. Before that they were kept in the town library as the Raccolta Comunale d'Arte. The chapel on the Castelnuovo road now stands empty of its painted surface.
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