By mid-13th century, an administrator under Pope Gregory IX, founded a hospital at an adjacent lot. For a time, it was an orphanage. A chapel, attached to a hospital, existed by 1378. From the 15th to the 18th century, the church and convent were attached to a Franciscan order.[1]
The present layout dates from 1583, by designs of Pietro Fiorini. It was enlarged with the addition of four large chapels in 1680 under the designs of Giovanni Battista Bergonzoni, a Franciscan theologian.
The interior is decorated with paintings by prominent Baroque painters. In the first chapel on the right is a Visitation by Il Galanino. In the 3rd chapel on the right is a Vision of St Elizabeth (1685) by Marc Antonio Franceschini. The third chapel to the left has a Holy Family with St Anthony of Padua(1680) by Felice Cignani.[2] The most prominent work in the church, in the 1st chapel on the left, is the altarpiece depicting the Crucifixion (1583) by a 23-year-old Annibale Carracci. The painting originally was found in the church of San Nicolò di San Felice.[3]
