Monuments around Salerno

Salerno and its surrounding

Monunents

Salerno. The Cathedral of San Matteo. Salerno owes its existence to the Longobards. It was created by, and owes its fortune and fame, to the Longobards.

The ‘Scuola Medica’ was the pride of the Curial city, pious and austere. The Longobard Court was a court of churches and Prince-like buildings/’palazzi’. The Normans came, became an integral part of this framework and made it their own.

And, seeing as later soverigns who conquered the South of Italy, preferred Salerno to other seats. Salerno’s era of splendour coincides with the last ones to deligth in her: the Normans.

 

 

The Duomo, the project of which was planned by Alfano, a Longobard and the Abbot of Cassino, was completed by decision of Roberto il Guiscardo. The building in Arab-Norman style presents one of the most deeply embedded structures of Southern Italian Romanic (1076-1085). The splended arcaded courtyard is still intect, airy and discreet, a miraculous mixture of polychrome hues and and plunder of excellent Paestum craftsmanship. The courtyard was later plundered in its turn at the dead of night by order of the Bourbon King in 1826, and deprived of its marvellous foutain (vasca of porfidio of Paestum origin too) originally collocated in the centre of the courtyard. The fountain was taken to Naples, where it can still be found today collocated in pride of place in the Villa (today known as the Viulla Comunale or Municipal Park). The bell tower steeple a stark tower with Arabian overtones, dates back to the middle of the XII century.


Amalfi. The construction of Amalfi, the Duomo (or Cathedral) with a flight of steep, wide steps leading up to and characterising the entrance., begun during the X century, its marvellous Byzantine Bronze Wide Door (XII century), which was renovated both iternally and externally (XVIII – XIX centuries), mainly conserves an Arab-Norman structure even in its bell-tower. At its side the Cloisters: ‘Il Chiostro del Paradiso’ once the cemetery of eminent Amalfitan families – Gothic style (X –XII centuries). The naval and maritime grandeur of the town is tangible in the Arsenal, in the vicinity of the beach, testimony of a glorious history a splendid Arabian – Norman construction (X-XIII centuries) with crossed vaults marking out two wide corridors that ghud with the rhythm of fortification.


Ravello. Villa Rufolo. A complex of significant structures constructed during the second half of the XVIII century strongly influenced by Arabian architecture. The Courtyard with its dual sequence of intersected arching/arches, boasts in the gardens of the Villa replanted carefully with exotic plants in the 1800s, a splendid window box of flowers over looking the silky sea in the distance. Such a suggestive image evoked in him. R. Wagner tells us, the inspiration for ‘Parsifal’ as it did no less for E. Grieg and his ‘Lieder’.

The kitchen is really incredible, a fairy tale environment, where legend has it, during the 500s, an omelette containing 1000 eggs was prepared for the Emperor Charles V and his followers.


Padula. The Certosa – The Carthusian Monastery. The most important monument of the South of Italy is numbered amongst the most important Carthusian Monasteries in Euripe. The Cloisters (il Chiostro maggiore) are the largest in Italy. Constructed during the Anou era (1306) the Certosa has during the years been continually embellished and enriched, e.g. with the Baroque church and with extensions to most of the rooms.