San Niccolò al Carmine, Siena

San Niccolò al Carmine, also called Santa Maria del Carmine is a Renaissance style, Roman Catholic church and monastery located in Pian dei Mantellini #30, near the corner of Via della Diana in the Terzo de Citta of Siena, region of Tuscany, Italy. The church now serves as the Oratory for the Contrada of Pantera. Across the street from the belltower is the Palazzo Celsi Pollini. North along Pian dei Mantellini, toward the Arco delle Due Porte, and on the same side of the street are a number of palaces built around what was once the Monastery of the Derelict Women: in order they are the Neoclassical Palazzo Incontri, the Palazzo Ravissa and the Palazzo Segardi.

History

Tradition holds that some hermits lived at the site in 770; the site then acquired an aedicule with the icon of the Mantellini. A church and convent of the Carmelites developed at the site and was documented since about 1265. At this time, the church was outside the walls of the medieval city, outside the Porta de Due Porte, also called the Gate of Stalloregi and the Arco di Santa Lucia. In the 14th-century, the convent was engrossed by the Walls of Siena. The church and bell-tower as we see it today was designed by Baldassare Peruzzi in 1517; work continued on the church until the 17th century. Later it became a military barrack.