Recently reopened for worship thanks to careful restoration, the church dates to the mid twelfth century. Dependent on the nearby Sant'Andrea parish, Santa Maria saw a great increase in its wealth during the thirteenth century when several well-off Pistoian families, who had chosen to live in the Borgo di Ripalta just outside the second circle of city wails (vs8), donated great works of art to enrich the church. The Taviani family's commission of an important fresco work for the choir is particularly noteworthy: The Ascension was painted in the late 1200s by Manfredino d'Alberto (vs27). Later the Ripalta parishioners commissioned Giovanni Pisano (vs26)to make the wooden Crucifix that is housed today in the nearby church of Sant'Andrea (vs25), The cross would become the object of special devotion because of the miracles it is said to have performed during the terrible plague that hit Pistoia at the end of the fourteenth century. An inscription under the portico recalls how the bishop Andrea Franchi ordered a procession with the aim of driving away the sickness (vi). As worship of the miraculous image became more widespread, the Chapel of the Crucifix was built and became the right wing of the transept A,(the left wing is formed by the Chapel of Saint Agnes B,thus definitively changing the simple nave structure into a more recognizable Latin cross plan.
Outside a portico of semi-circular arches was added in the seventeenth century; this leads to the large interior hall which still preserves remarkable fragments of carefully restored frescos that add an important chapter to the history of Medieval painting in Pistoia. In the lunette on the façade, we see a thirteenth century Majestas Domini which, like the Ascension on the choir, has been attributed to Manfredino d'Alberto.
In the 1300s other artists were at work in the Ripalta Church: Antonio Vite (vs36/40/44) who painted the Virgin and Child fresco as well as the Master of the Bracciolini Chapel (vs41) who created the Lamentationof the Deposed Christ.

(n.) refers to the number of the file-card (s.i.) means see information inside

The Procession of the White Robes and the Ripalta Crucifix

In the summer of 1399 when another plague epidemic began to spread through Tuscany, a solemn penitential procession ordered by the bishop left Pistoia to drive the sickness from the city. The penitents wore white robes which gave the procession its name: Processione dei Bianchi. The faithful held up the Ripalta Crucifix on which they fixed their hope and they went around to other Tuscan. cities. Since they lived in an infected community and ignored even the most elementary rules of hygiene, they became carriers of the disease. Ser Luca Dominici who witnessed the events wrote: many of our group, upon its return, had dirty and blackened garments... a/so because they never took them off.