Architettura e spazi comunitari tra XII e XIII secolo: le canoniche dei Santi Pietro e Andrea di Rivalta di Torino e di Sant’Andrea di Vercelli

The contribution aims to investigate some religious architectures preserved in Piedmont area, with particular reference to the canonical complexes of Santi Pietro e Andrea of Rivalta di Torino (TO) and of Sant’Andrea of Vercelli, founded starting from the XII century within the regular reform initiatives of the canonical clergy. If the normative and literary sources constitute important documentary evidence for understanding the plurality of the programmatic paths pursued to regulate the life of canons, it is extremely difficult to investigate what kind of results these processes produced on the material level. More specifically, it is intended to focus particular attention on the Vercellese study case, thanks to the outcomes of a recent research led on the architecture, which have made it possible to formulate some interpretative hypotheses relating to the articulation and use of spaces by the community of canons, first Victorine and then Lateranenses. Although the architectural construction sites of the Rivaltese and Vercellese canonical complexes develop over a broad chronological span and in different territorial contexts, the morphology of the planimetric systems (original or derived from successive transformations in Modern Ages) which peculiarly characterizes them seems to depend on the will to adapt the material structures to the regulatory requirements, according to shared programs in which the architecture is used to contribute in “regulating” the life of canons within the communities, as well as their external relations.