The construction of the Church and Convent began in 1673 and completed in 1774. Though it survived the 1687 and 1746 earthquakes, it suffered extensive damage in the 1970 earthquake.
The Church is noted for its architecture, a high example of Baroque art, and features an Islamic inspired Dome carved in wood. The vaults of the central and two side naves are painted in a mix of Moorish and Spanish designs. The main altar is totally made from wood. The halls of the head cloister are inlaid with Sevillian glazed tiles dating from the 1620s.
The complex is made of the Temple, the Convent and two other churches, "The Solitude" (La Soledad) and "The Miracle" (El Milagro).
The Convent's Library is world-renowned. It possesses about 25,000 ancient texts and 13 paintings of the biblical patriarch Jacob and his 12 sons. The paint of the Last Supper depicts typical Peruvian ingredients and meals such as guinea pig, potatoes and chillis. Also peculiar is the Devil hovering besides Judas.
The Convent originally included 7 cloisters : -Main Courtyard, -Bonaventure, -Francis Solanus buried in the convent church, -Pepper Yard, -Infirmary, -Novitiate, and -the 3rd Order. During the works to open Abancay Avenue in 1940, part of the Convent, including Bonaventure's courtyard, was demolished, and the section used by the Franciscan 3rd Order was separated from the Main structure.
It is believed that the 3rd Order of Saint Francis was the oldest of all the 3rd Orders. The Order formed probably in the 12th century. Its purpose is obscure, but some chroniclers said that certain noblemen of Lombardy were taken as captives to Germany by the Emperor Henry V (1081-1125) following a rebellion in the area and after suffering exile for some time, they assumed a sort of penitential garb giving their pledges of future loyalty to the King if they were permitted to return to Lombardy.
Lombardy (Long Beard) as a region, was settled at least since the 2nd millennium BC, as shown by the archaeological findings of ceramics, arrows, axes, and carved stones. Well-preserved rock drawings depicting animals, people and symbols were made over a period of 8,000 years preceding the Iron Age. In the following centuries the area was inhabited by different peoples among whom the Etruscans, who founded the city of Mantua and spread the use of writing; later, starting from the 5h century BC, the area was inhabited by Celtic-Galic Tribes. These people settled in several cities, including Milan, and extended their rule to the Adriatic Sea.
Lombardy was referred during early Middle Ages to the entire territory of Italy, ruled by the Lombards, who conquered much of the Italian Peninsula beginning in the 6th century. Their development was halted by the Roman expansion from the 3rd BC onwards. During and after the Fall of the Roman Empire, Lombardy as a region, suffered heavily by a series of invasions by tribal people. The last and most effective was that of the Germanic Lombards who came around the 570s and whose long-lasting reign, with its capital in Pavia, gave the current name to the region. There was a close relationship between the Frankish, Bavarian, and Lombard nobility for many centuries.
After the decisive Battle of Pavia, the Duchy of Milan became a possession of the House of Habsburg or House of Austria, the most influential royal houses of Europe. The throne of the Holy Roman Empire was continuously occupied by them between 1438 and 1740. The House of Austria also produced emperors and kings of the Kingdom of Bohemia, Kingdom of England, Kingdom of Germany, Kingdom of Hungary, Kingdom of Croatia, Kingdom of Ireland, Kingdom of Portugal, and Habsburg Spain, as well as rulers of several Dutch and Italian principalities.
From the 16th century, following the reign of Charles V, the dynasty was split between its Austria and Spanish branches. Although they ruled distinct territories, they nevertheless maintained close relations and frequently intermarried.
The House took its name from the Habsburg Castle, a medieval fortress built in the 1020s, and located in Habsburg, Switzerland, in the semi-sovereign state (canton) of Aargau, near the Aar River. The Aar is a tributary of the High Rhine and the longest River that both rises and ends entirely within Switzerland.
In 1134, many groups of people assumed a penitential ideology that spread rapidly. It gave rise to 2 new branches of a distinctive form of religious life, a second order composed of women, and third order composed of priests. The order of priests, once formed, claimed precedence over the other branches and on the model of mendicant behavior that allowed them traveling and live in rural areas for purposes of evangelization, such as the Dominicans or the Franciscans, was styled as the "First Order." They gave rise to groups later successfully institutionalized, such as Francis of Assisi's Order of Friars Minor.
The most chilling aspect in the Convent of San Francisco is a series of catacombs built of bricks and mortar, very solid that have stood up well to earthquakes, and served as a burial-place until 1808. The catacombs have on display the bones of more than 25,000 people, members of guilds and brotherhoods. The bones (femurs, tibiae, and craniums) of the members, at least those that are more than 10 meters deep, echo a symbolic and ritualistic intention, and, they are laid out in geometric shapes, especially in mandala patterns, suggesting the metaphysical purpose of all of them. They are suppose to absorb seismic waves.
The catacombs remained secretly for a long time until its re-discovery in 1943. It is believed there existed secret passageways that connected to the city Cathedral and the Tribunal of the Holy Inquisition and other churches through a network of underground tunnels.
The Convent charms the first time visitors from the very second they walk through its gate by its magnificent architecture and its two identical towers. Once they make their way inside, they are continuously amazed by the beautiful carvings, which are so realistic that it is hard to believe that the robes of the saints are actually intricate carvings from the wood that once was a living and breathing tree.
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