The Basilica di Santa Giulia is a medieval former church in Bonate Sotto. Built in the early 12th century, only its apse area remain today in a short plain outside the town.
According to local tradition, it would have been founded by St. Julia of Corsica herself, or by the Lombard queen Theodelinda. It is mentioned in a letter from 1129 by Pope Honorius II. An abbey had its centre here, being abandoned together with the church around the 14th century.
The church had a basilica plan, with a nave and two aisles with three apses; the interior was divided into five bays, of which only the last one preceding the apse area survives. The area without the ceiling is now home to a cemetery. The central apse was frescoed in 1795 by the Swiss painters Baldassarre and Vincenzo Angelo Orelli.
Notable are the sculpted capitals, with geometrical, animal or human figures, while the residual exterior decoration include small columns and Lombard bands.
References:The Church of St Donatus name refers to Donatus of Zadar, who began construction on this church in the 9th century and ended it on the northeastern part of the Roman forum. It is the largest Pre-Romanesque building in Croatia.
The beginning of the building of the church was placed to the second half of the 8th century, and it is supposed to have been completed in the 9th century. The Zadar bishop and diplomat Donat (8th and 9th centuries) is credited with the building of the church. He led the representations of the Dalmatian cities to Constantinople and Charles the Great, which is why this church bears slight resemblance to Charlemagne's court chapels, especially the one in Aachen, and also to the Basilica of San Vitale in Ravenna. It belongs to the Pre-Romanesque architectural period.
The circular church, formerly domed, is 27 m high and is characterised by simplicity and technical primitivism.