The earliest mention of the existence of a church in Ornica dates back to the 14th century, when a small chapel dedicated to St. Ambrose, governed by a chaplain, was erected on the site of the present building.
The church was subject to the parish of Santa Brigida, from which it broke away in 1456, becoming an autonomous parish guaranteed by an annuity for the parish priest's livelihood, paid by the population.
The Acts of the pastoral visitation of St. Charles on October 23, 1566, give us some information about this church: it had five altars, of which the high altar was consecrated and adorned with a beautiful altarpiece (this is probably the polyptych of St. Ambrose); it also had a tiny sacristy and a bell tower with two bells.
All that remains today of this church, which was very small, is the presbytery that corresponds to the present sacristy, with the cross vault frescoed by Angelo Baschenis.
The present building, in the late Baroque style, with a Latin-cross nave divided into three bays and a low arched vault, was built in the first half of the eighteenth century on the initiative of parish priest Don Giacomo Pesenti, who invested much of his private wealth in it.
The pride of the church in Ornica is the Polyptych of St. Ambrose, a 16th-century work attributed to a painter of the school of Cima da Conegliano. The polyptych is enclosed in its original, exquisitely carved and gilded frame, is divided into four registers and includes as many as fourteen panels.
Can be visited before and after masses (which are generally officiated on weekends in the summer period and on major holidays).
Free tour with Altobrembo guides, volume I itinerary 5). Included in the itineraries : The Land of the Baschenis, the Polyptychs.
Guided tours by appointment.
