In the center of Como, in a recess of Piazza Roma at the corner with Via Rodari, stands the small and very ancient Church of San Provino, nestled among historic buildings, where the marriage between Alessandro Volta and Donna Teresa Peregrini was celebrated on September 22, 1794. The choice of this secluded church says much about the character of the inventor of the electric battery, who, although an affable participant in social salons, always maintained a deep spirituality and great reserve in his personal affections. In the wedding announcements sent to friends and relatives, he repeatedly praised the qualities of his bride. In a letter to Giacomo Rezia, a distinguished physician and former rector of the University of Pavia, after commending the “prudence, wisdom, intelligence, and skill in household management” of all the Peregrini sisters (there were seven), he emphasized that “the one Heaven has destined for me, besides possessing greater personal charm and sweetness of character, surpasses the others also in cultivation of mind.” The Church of San Provino, which today hosts the Romanian Orthodox parish of Saint Hierarch Gregory Palamas, is one of the oldest churches in Como and, according to tradition, of Lombard origin. It changed its dedication—from Saint Anthony (whether the Abbot or the Martyr is uncertain) to Saint Provino—in 1096, the year in which it received the relics of Como’s second bishop, previously kept in the early Christian church of Saints Gervasius and Protasius, which he himself had built at the beginning of the fifth century on Via Anzani, a building that no longer exists.
