CHURCH OF SAN FRANCISCO The Franciscan Order was founded by Saint Francis native from Assisi in present-day Italy, toward the beginning of XIII century. The Franciscans arrived to Qosqo by the first years of the conquest and were located by the San Blas district, later in the Nazarenas Square, in the ancient Qasana palace belonging to Inka Pachakuteq in the Main Square and finally in their present-day location over the San Francisco Square toward 1549. It is not known who the architect was that designed the present-time building; however, it is known that Francisco Dominguez Chavez y Arellano, a Cusquenian architect who worked as the chief mason finished it. The structure of the church is relatively simple and has just one tower and two gates, but it is solid and made with andesites from pre-Hispanic buildings. Its original artworks were destroyed by a priest that "modernized" the church with coarse neoclassical plaster-made artworks. Its Major Altar is neoclassical and made in plaster having a Saint Francis of Assisi effigy in the central part and above it is the Virgin of the Immaculate Conception. There are also 11 other minor altarpieces, all of them made in plaster; it has an ancient cedar wood pulpit too. |
