Dating
The Mother Church (or Chiesa Matrice or Duomo), dedicated to the apostles Peter and Paul, patron saints and protectors of the city, dates back to quite ancient times even if with certainty it is not possible to specify the year of its foundation. However, roughly around the middle of the fourteenth century, at least the time when one of the oldest buildings of this temple was initiated can be established. Certainly in this church he took office in the Greek rite until the times of Pope Sixtus IV (1471-1484), when he ordered all the ecclesiastics of the dioceses of Salento to adopt the Latin rite. Parish church, reduced in time in precarious static conditions, was rebuilt in the years 1621-1633, [On the first cornice, beyond the town's coat of arms, the following inscription is shown: PRINCIPI APOSTOLORUM ORDO SACER ET CIVES GALATINAE URBIS AEDIFIED A.D. MDCXXI. (M. Montinari, S.d.G., p. 164)] [On the architrave of the first order there is in fact the following inscription: PRINCIPI APOSTOLORUM ORDO SACER ET CIVES GALATINAE URBIS RAISING A.D. MDCXXXX. (Guide of Galatina, P. 48) and from Parrocchia it was elevated to Collegiata in 1664. The construction of the building was resumed later in the following century and completed in 1770. [On the second order of the façade, in the cornice of crown lintel is engraved with the following inscription: INCHOATUM OLIM OPUS TANDEM PIETATE CIVIUM PERFECTUM AD 1770 D. ANGELO VERNALEONE SYNDICO].
Statuary Style and Iconography
The church, in late Baroque style, is in Lecce stone. It overlooks the homonymous St. Peter's Square and seems very likely that at first it could be dedicated not to the Princes of the Apostles, but to the Immaculate Conception of Mary.
The statue of the Immaculate Conception is located in the middle of the façade, on the central portal. In the upper part of the central portal, on the right is the statue of St. Peter and to his left the statue of St. Joseph. On the side doors, on the right, there is the statue of San Marco and, on the left, the statue of San Sebastiano. In the second order of the façade there are still two other statues of saints: in the right-hand niche San Trifone and in the left one of San Paolo. Such an iconographic-statuary structure presupposes certainly, if not a different dedication of the church over time, as it is possible, according to a hypothesis that is already found formulated by A. Antonaci in a note to the text of the History of Galatina by M. Montinari , at least a very strong radicalization in our population of devotion and worship to the Blessed Virgin Mary Mother of God, whose statue is placed here, on the podium of honor, in the center of the facade of this church.
The frescoes and the polychrome altars
Of particular interest are the frescoes of the vault, by the Neapolitan Vincenzo Paliotti (1), with some episodes from the Vita di S.Pietro, dated 1875, together with the splendid polychrome marble altars. Of great value that of the ancient chapel of the Sacrament, of the second half of the '600, destroyed by the earthquake of 1701 and redone, where there is the beautiful statue of the Immaculate, in white marble, sculptural work by Giuseppe Sammartino. The marble altar, built at his own expense in the period 1664-1674 by the archbishop of Otranto at the time, Monsignor Adarzo de Santander, was of Neapolitan manufacture of the eighteenth century. In the frontal he had the perspective of a stylized sarcophagus, adorned in the sides and in the superior degree of flowered scrolls and white marble rosettes on green, yellow and violet backgrounds. The case was surmounted by three white marble seraphim, while two others adorned the ends of the upper degree. On the custody there was a small tabernacle perspective for the exposition of the Sacrament.
Also valuable are the paintings in the church and in the sacristy, with the marvelous Lavender of the feet (2), of 1756, by Serafino Elmo, and Jesus walking on the water and Apparition of Christ to St. Peter, all in the back of the façade. Absolutely not to be overlooked: stop and admire the St. Peter, a silver half-length statue, and the treasure of the relics and sacred furnishings (when possible), a conspicuous gift from Msgr. Lorenzo Mongiò, bishop of Lanciano and then of Pozzuoli, to the Collegiate of Galatina.