Page 67 - C_Modena

Biblioteca Giuridica Universitaria | University’s Law Library 145

The Historical Events

The Monastery was located in a wide quadrilateral of about 9,000
square meters in the south-west area of the city, on the outskirts of
the historical city centre, where the urban fabric thinned out towards
the city walls. It bordered to east with the sixteenth-century Corpus
Domini monastery, now seat of the “Carlo Sigonio” High School, spe-
cialised in educational psychology. The monastery of San Geminiano
- founded in the fifteenth century and seat of the Department of Law
- stood beyond Via Camatta, thereby creating a wide area composed of
cloisters and gardens. The other borders of San Paolo were represented
to the west by today’s via Francesco Selmi - previously Contrada di San
Paolo, where the homonymous church was located; to the south by via
Caselle; to the north by a Stradello, a pathway, now a continuation of via
Camatta, which separated the monastery from the Renaissance build-
ing belonging to the Foschieri marquises, which was destroyed during
the 1960’s and replaced by a garage, and by another neighbouring
building belonging to the Valentini Counts.
The Stradello was partly occupied by an open-air waterway, one of the
two branches of the Modonella or Modenella canal, also known as Cama-
tta. This toponym came from an old “Casamatta” in which a guazzatoio,
a place where the animals could drink and be washed, was created to
wash the horses, which was later closed in 1827.
In the north-west corner of the area, the church of San Paolo is located,
which was an ancient parish founded in 1192 on a pathway that con-
nected to a secondary entrance gate of the city walls to Piazza Grande,
the heart of the city. From 1491 the Augustinians arrived, forced to
abandon the monastery of Santa Maria della Misericordia, outside Por-
ta Ganaceto. There they would build their accommodation also em-
ploying, in 1495, building demolition materials coming from Palazzo

Il Monastero di San Paolo nella pianta della città di Modena di Gian Battista Boccabadati, The Monastery of San Paolo in the city map of Modena by Gian Battista Boccabadati,
in Domenico Vandelli, Copia della delineazione già fatta dal sig. Boccabadati l’anno MDCLXXXIV […] in Domenico Vandelli, Copy of the delineation already made by Mr. Boccabadati in the year 1684 […],
Gallerie Estensi, Biblioteca Estense Universitaria, Modena Estense Galleries, Biblioteca Estense Universitaria, Modena
(Su concessione del Ministero per i Beni e le Attività Culturali) (Upon concession by the Ministry for Cultural Heritage and Activities)
Veduta del Cortile del Leccio dal loggiato del primo piano View of the Cortile del Leccio from the loggia on the first floor