It was built by Galla Placidia, as votive for a missed shipwreck while she was traveling from Constantinople to Ravenna in 424 for the enthronement of her son Valentiniano III. The three nave church underwent various interventions during various epochs until it was finally nearly rebuilt totally during the air bombings of 1944. In front of the building there is a quadrangular enclosure with a marble portal of the 4th century on the lunette of which the apparition of St. John to Galla Placidia is represented.
The current facade of St. John the Evangelist Church
St. John the Evangelist Church as it appeared in the years 1880-90– Raccolte Museali Fratelli Alinari, Firenze
St. John the Evangelist Church as it appeared in the 1930 – Archivi Alinari, Firenze
The monastery adjacent to St. John the Evangelist Church, used as a civil hospital, represented by Gaetano Savini, in 1900, in Ravenna panoramic map view from the south.
The gothic marble portal
Portal – the lunette: detail which depicts the apparition of San Giovanni to Galla Placidia
The cloister on the right of the church, accessible from Via Carducci: view of the bell tower
The cloister: detail of the well.
The interior of the church
The apse mosaic demolished by Abbot Teseo Aldrovandi in 1576. Design performed by Franco Franchini in 2009 according to written documents.
Fragment medieval mosaic pavement (XIII sec.): Scene of the Fourth Crusade
Fragment medieval mosaic pavement (XIII sec.): farewell scene to his wife by the Knight
Fragment medieval mosaic pavement (XIII sec.): a fantastic animal
Fragment medieval mosaic pavement (XIII sec.): a fantastic figure
Fourteenth-century chapel with frescoes attributed to Giotto’s school of Pietro da Rimini
The banquet of Ahasuerus, di Carlo Bononi, oil on canvas, 600×700 cm, 1620 ca. (wall above the entrance to the church door)
