Eucharistic Miracle of Volterra

The Story

The Eucharistic Miracle of Volterra is a Catholic tradition connected with the Tuscan hill town of Volterra and dated to 1472, the year the city was sacked during its war with Florence. The documents describing the event are preserved in the archives of the Church of San Francesco in Volterra. According to the traditional account, a soldier entered one of the city's churches during the sack and seized a precious ivory ciborium containing consecrated Hosts. In contempt for the Sacrament, he hurled it against a wall as he left. Tradition holds that the ciborium shattered, but the Hosts emerged unharmed and, illuminated by a mysterious light, rose and remained suspended in the air before the onlookers. The Hosts were then reverently gathered and restored to the tabernacle. Accounts of the episode vary in their details, and some versions add further signs said to have accompanied the sacrilege. The tradition has been read in Volterra as a sign of God's protection of the Blessed Sacrament amid the violence of war, and as a call to reparation for offenses against the Eucharist. It took its place among the many medieval and Renaissance Eucharistic traditions of Tuscany that nourished popular devotion to the Real Presence. Today the memory of the event endures in Volterra, a walled city also known for its Etruscan and medieval heritage. Visitors can pray in the town's historic churches, including San Francesco, where the documentary record of the tradition is kept, and the account continues to invite the faithful to reverence for Christ present in the Eucharist.

Church Recognition

A longstanding local devotion of the Church in Volterra; documents describing the event are preserved in the archives of the Church of San Francesco, and the tradition is included in the Church-sponsored catalogues of Eucharistic miracles.

Catholic Teaching

The tradition points to the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist and to the reverence and reparation owed to the Blessed Sacrament (Catechism of the Catholic Church 1373–1381).

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1 Additional Information ▾

A recognized Tuscan devotion.

Go Deeper

The Volterra tradition is documented in the 'Eucharistic Miracles of the World' exhibition compiled by Blessed Carlo Acutis (miracolieucaristici.org). For the Church's teaching on the Eucharist and its worship, see Catechism of the Catholic Church 1373–1381 and 1418.