The construction of the church which is incorporated into the Royal Palace (the entrance is from via Pecorari) began in the first half of the 14th century. Azzone Visconti had it built as a chapel for the ducal court, and tradition has it that the Cre-monese architect Francesco Pecorari was in charge of the project.
The Gothic character of the outside remains: the portal, the apse with its cusped windows, the upper loggia and the elegant bell-tower by Pecorari. The base of the bell-tower is square: it then becomes octagonal with slender stone columns covering each of the eight corners; it has monoforus windows on the lower levels and biforus windows on the fourth level, while two layers of superimposed arches adorn the fifth level, above which there is a charming gallery of columns surmounted by a conical cusp with a statue of the Archangel Gabriel in copper on the top.
Church of San Gottardo in Corte: The interior
The interior was completely remodeled and trans-formed in the Neoclassical period, and contains a fragment of a fresco of the Crucifixion, which used to be outside, painted towards the middle of the 14th century by a follower of Giotto; also a canvas by Cerano of San Carlo in Glory and the Sepulcher of Azzone Visconti by Giovanni di Balduccio.
