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9. Chapel of St.Michael
The ancient chapel of St Michael Archangel stands on the summit of the tufa rockface overlooking the Basilica of St Elia. It seems that the veneration of the Archangel Michael developed in Castel S. Elia together with Marian devotion at the time of the Benedictine monks. The chapel was built in memory of the apparition of the Prince of the Angels to St Anastasias Abbot during the period when the Benedictines were resident in Castel S. Elia. The ancientness of the chapel is confirmed not only by the fresco in the Basilica of St Elia (12th cent.), but by two marble plaques placed next to the altar (9th and 12th cent.).
The church is covered by a trussed roof with wooden beams that are soberly decorated with oil colours. Above the altar is a painting, of the second half of the 19th century, that portrays St Michael Archangel calling some Benedictine monks to heaven.
Enlarged and restored by Mgr B. Doebbing, the chapel was renewed and improved in 1983 by the Michaelite Fathers.
Near the chapel, on the edge of the rock, is the underground cemetery where, among others, the body of Mgr B. Doebbing rests.
This square marble relief was interpreted by Prof. H. Pfeiffer (Pontifical Gregorian University) who described the plaque as follows: the whole tablet is divided by plaited gibbons into nine fields. This is undoubtedly a mention of heaven (e.g. the nine angelic choirs). The three rosettes are also a symbol of paradise. The three pomegranates each signify the church that gathers the members of God’s people, and they also express the fruit of love. The three-fold repetition means that these fruits are fruits for paradise, for heaven. The three monsters are demonic forces, which have by now the function of guardians of paradise allowing only Saints and the innocent to enter, while all others are forbidden. But it is also all a mystery closed through the symbolism of the numbers 3 and 9 and through the plaited gibbons. The plaque dates to the 9th century.
