The church of Santa Maria Elisabetta in Peia (Italy): from history to structural issues

The church of S. Maria Elisabetta was built in 1574 next to the “Wool Road” thanks to the offers of merchants: they left generous donations in cash or artworks to protect their goods from robbers. The church experienced its heyday when trade bloomed. Then, its slow decline started. In 1969 the roof collapsed, together with almost one third of the presbytery vault, and destroyed what was left of the wooden altar, bringing to light all the frescoes behind it. To assess the safety of the church, a detailed and accurate finite element model was developed. Both the self-weight and the thrust of the soil on part of the lateral walls were taken into account. The tensile stresses in some parts of the church are found to be sufficiently high to induce further crack growth. The numerical results are used to propose a simple retrofitting strategy for the building.