Church of San Paolo

The church of San Paolo is a parish church of the vicariate of Bobbio, Alta Val Trebbia, Aveto and Oltre Penice of the diocese of Piacenza-Bobbio, located in the hamlet of Mezzano Scotti di Bobbio in the province of Piacenza.

In Roman times there was the village of Medianum, the seat of the pagus Domitius. In Lombard times in the village, again in the 7th century, the monastery of St. Paul would be founded by monks from Bobbio in the time of Abbot Attala. The area as a monastic cell appears in a 747 document of the Bobbio Monastery, while in 891 in another document there is also mention of the Monastery of St. Paul, second in power to the Bobiense monastery. In fact it was autonomous and as for Bobbio possessed various fiefs scattered throughout northern Italy, twinned to the foundations of the Bobbian monks; at first it followed the mixed Columbian rule, that is, already with the first reform of the rule after welcoming the Benedictines and then later after the general reform of Benedict d'Aniane definitely the Benedictine one. The Monastery of Mezzano, fortified after 1000, and the territory came under the dependencies of the municipality of Piacenza in 1141. Attached to the monastery was the castle, and documents attest to the presence of a large water-filled moat and a tower. By the 13th century the monastery was in decline. After the Scotti took over the territory of Mezzano and the monastery, in 1460 the few monks had to retreat to the nearby hamlet of Cadonica, where they founded the new monastic seat, which can be seen today in the fortified tower and nearby oratory. After the move there was complete decay, and of the ancient monastery today only the ruins remain. The castle restored in 1506 passed to the Lateran Canons of the Church of Santa Maria della Passione in Milan. In 1551 the fortress was ceded to Count Antonio Caracciolo, later it was repurposed as a stately residence, in the mid-19th century it passed along with the properties of Cadonica and the Tower, to the Follini, one of the oldest and most important families of the place. In 1924 the collapse of the castle occurred during modernization works; what remains of the fortress is incorporated into the complex of buildings still owned by the Follinis. The hamlet would later be incorporated into the territory of the municipality of Travo, until 1927 when it became part of the municipality of Bobbio.

The present church arose in the 16th century as a new foundation of the Piacenza church, depending directly on the Diocese of Piacenza. The building several times remodeled in the 18th and 19th centuries, underwent the change in orientation of the facade.

In 1989, after the union of the Diocese of Piacenza with the Diocese of Bobbio, there is the transition to the Bobbio vicariate.

The following churches depend on the parish of Mezzano Scotti: Oratory of St. Charles Borromeo, in the hamlet of Poggio d'Areglia, Oratory of the Wedding of the Virgin, in the hamlet of Cadonica, Chapel of St. Lawrence, in the hamlet of Case S. Lorenzo di Fosseri, Church of St. Andrew, in the hamlet of Cassolo, Oratory of Our Lady of the Rosary, in the hamlet of Freddezza, Oratory of Our Lady of Caravaggio, near the Pietra Parcellara and the hamlet of Brodo.

The annual feast is January 25, on the solemnity of the Conversion of St. Paul.