Naples - Funicular and City Views

Vesuvius looms over metropolitan Naples. 

To get to the Castel Sant’Elmo and the Certosa de San Martino we took the funicular railway from the station just west of the Via Toledo.

It was quite an experience. The dog was strange; there was a dog that no one seemed to be paying attention to sitting in the middle of one of the cars. It was still there when we came back down.

The station and the cars are delightful. Lots of 19th century detail (thankfully not in the cars).

Upon arriving on top of the Vomero I felt as if we were in a very different world than the Naples of the Centro Historico. The first thing we noticed was that it was so clean. It lacked the gritty graffiti of the lower city. Oh there was graffiti  it just seemed cleaner.  Even the supermarket we stopped at was cleaner. The clerk was from Newcastle, which made me laugh.

It also lacked that soiled mattress smell that gave so much character to the old city.

An even more amazing thing is the well placed signage that clearly pointed the way to the Castel Sant’Elmo and the Certosa di San Martino.

Below, Dallas! No, actually the Centro Direzionale from the Certosa San Martino.  A number of landmarks can be seen in this picture.  It gives you an impression of how dense the historical center really is.  These were taken from the forecourt of the San Martino Monastery (certosa di San Martino) where a number of people had gathered for the sunset to drink wine and be merry. Really awesome place.  

From mid left: Santa Maria Maggiore, just below that the Piazza Dante, the Duomo, San Lorenzo Maggiore (and Tower),  San Domenico Maggiore and the San Domenico Plague Column. 

Looking north towards the Palace of Capodimonte in the distance.

Naples/Caserta - Palace of Caserta - Gardens

One of the features of the park that I think is fantastic beyond all that is fantastic is the 3 km long “pond” with a 70 foot tall cascade at the end of it. After the cramped quarters of the Centro Historico in Naples, the open English style park with its great wazzok of a “pond” is rather nice. As with the palace itself the impression is one of overwhelming size, quantity rather than quality. This is sad because there are actually some really amazing sculptures here, they just get a little lost in the sheer vastness of it all.

To walk around the pond/canal it takes about an hour with stopping at each fountain and terrace for a good look and photo op. I would recommend taking an umbrella if it is drizzling or raining. The ornamental trees provide little protection from the elements.



There are tons of sculptures, mostly in collected groups: the arts, the sciences, personifications of architecture, geography etc. and urns supported by tritons and putti. I bet in the summer it must be delightful, but around about New Year’s it’s a little depressing, especially with the drizzle and fog.  The sheer size makes up for it though, damned impressive.

Every quarter kilometer or so one comes to a new fountain and or terrace. Each with it's own theme and dripping with ornament and sculpture.

First up is the fountain of dolphins.  They are sort of proto-evolution dolphins as they have claws and are actually rather terrifying. If marvelously sculpted in a grotesquely fantastic way. 

Can't sleep the dolphins will eat me! 

Next up is the Fountain of Aeolus. Here is a sort of grotto with several dozen zephyrs spouting water jets.

Fountain of Aeolus. I'd love to get in that artificial grotto, it looks cool! 

After the fountain of Aeolus comes the Fountain of Ceres.  I think she is holding a medallion of Persephone? 

Ceres, being all fountain like. 

The palace gets further and further away.

It's gonna be a long walk back. 

The fountain of Venus and Adonis is next. 

Not entirely sure what is going on in this sculpture but it looks darn sexy.

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Finally the statue of Diana and Actaeon, the unfortunate peeping Tom.  For his crime of catching the goddess Diana in the nude he was turned into a stag and torn apart by hunting dogs. Nice! Give me that old time religion. The cascade leads from a grotto about 200 feet above the fountain.

Fountain of Diana and Actaeon. 

Someone liked to sculpt dogs methinks. Here's Actaeon getting torn apart:

And here's Diana with all her bathing attendants. It suddenly all becomes clear:

One last look at the cascade from close up and back to the palace. During the summer there are acres of garden to explore.

Naples/Caserta - Palace of Caserta - Interior

Lion on Staircase at the Palace of Caserta

Staircase

Staircase at Caserta with Octagonal Hall

The central octagonal hall on the Piano Nobile was inspired by Santa Maria Della Salute in Venice (one of my favorite Churches, so light and airy). Walking around the hall the spatial composition is mind bogglingly beautiful. The staircase is magnificent; absolutely a work of art, double plus the lions are so cute!

The chapel was designed after Louis XIV’s royal chapel at Versailles, it is a fair imitation. The throne room has an incredible ceiling, however, after that though the interior goes downhill very quickly. I’m not sure if it just needs restoration but it really seems like the designers were just phoning it in. Now this could be because the palace was remodeled in the early 19th century during that whole Joachim Murat fiasco. Or it could be that I am just spoiled after the palaces of Russia and France.

Some of the neoclassical-empire style decoration is elegant, but most of it is ponderously academic, over large, lacking in detail or in a few cases, sense.

But the staircase and the octagonal hall! Totally worth the trip.

Chapel at Caserta 

Naples /Caserta - Palace of Caserta

Caserta, Front Facade 

If you have a half day to spare and have already visited Herculaneum I would recommend heading out to the Palace of Caserta.

Trains leave Napoli Centrale in Piazza Garibaldi about every 10-20 minutes. It’s a fairly easy ride on a commuter train. Tried to take a bus, but was repeatedly mauled by ancient gypsy woman while trying to read the timetable, so went with the train.

The train drops off as Caserta’s railway station in, can you guess? Piazza Giuseppe Garibaldi in Caserta. As you exit the station the palace is right there in front of you being big and palace-like. I am not kidding about the big, at 1,200 rooms it is one of the largest palaces in Europe.

Started in the 1750’s Caserta, when the Bourbon monarchy was ruling Naples, it was designed with the massive palace of Versailles in mind. However, Caserta was finished in less than thirty years whereas Construction on Versailles continued for 120 years and never reached full completion. Like the Royal Palace in Naples it was built as a symbol of power and as a sort of tribute to the idea of monarchy. Somewhat like the Escorial in Spain, Caserta was meant to be more than just a palace. It was also to contain a military barracks and a university, skipping the monastery included in the Escorial’s plan. I get the impression that Carlo de Bourbon really just liked huge buildings. The palace of the poor in Naples was built at the same time (see: Albergo dei Poverei).

In April 1945 the palace was the site of the signing of terms of the unconditional German surrender of forces in Italy. The agreement covered between 600,000 and 900,000 soldiers along the Italian Front including troops in sections of Austria. It was also used in the tragic Star Wars Episodes I and II and served as the Vatican in a number of better movies.

Rear, Center Facade

One of four courtyard

Naples - Church of San Gregorio Armeno

On the Via San Gregorio Armeno is the Church and Monastery of San Gregorio Armeno, go figure? The street is famous for the makers of nativity scenes and all of the pieces that go in them. Some people refer to it as Christmas Alley.

Like all of the other buildings in this section of Naples the church was built on the site of a Roman temple.

One of the most intriguing elements of the complex is the lovely tower perched over the road; a truly beautiful piece of architecture.

And San Gregorio? Well He brought Christianity to Armenia then died of natural causes. In the fifth century his bones ended up all over the place including Naples and the church was founded here to house his relics. The building there now is actually from the 16th century and has a baroque interior that rivals any in Europe with its flamboyant treatment.

Naples - San Filippo e Giacomo

Church of San Filippo e Giacomo

Just a little to the west of Via San Gregorio Armeno down the extremely narrow Via S. Baigio dei Librai is the church of San Filippo e Giacomo.

The façade reconstructed in 1758 has often been compared to works by Borromini, the unfortunate architect behind San Carlo a Quattro Fontaine in Rome. This is another church that just appears out of nowhere next to a rather rickety looking block of flats with the cutest little Juliet balconies. I digress as is my wont…

The façade is divided into two superimposed orders. On the ground level a portal with a rounded pediment supported by a pair of engaged Ionic columns with swags of stone cloth hanging from the volutes, (whimsical! Also interestingly similar to San Lorenzo Maggiore which is in this same neighborhood and reworked about the same time) is flanked by niches filled with gigantic statues of St. Filippo (Phillip) and St. Giacomo (James). Each of the Apostles looks rather grand and stands on a funky beveled pedestal.

The second story has four well proportioned Corinthian pilasters and a couple more statues, topped off with a triangular pediment over the central projection only. All of this in whitish stone over a yellow painted stucco ground. Very bright, very pretty.

When I think how the bright colours and innovative shapes of the Neapolitan baroque remind me of St. Petersburg, I am also reminded that most of the architects in the mid 18th century in Russia were Italian (Rastrelli et al).

Saint James (Giacomo, also the name of my Neapolitan great-grandfather), son of Alphaeus was one of the Apostles, though he isn’t really mentioned much in the New Testament. Which is understandable there was someone else there who had a bit more of a starring role.

Saint Phillip (Filippo) we know a little more about. Also one of the Apostles and the patron saint of pastry chefs (for obvious reasons laid out in John) and hatters (I have no clue, perhaps he was mad? Maybe he dealt in felt or mercury?). Phillip was originally from Bethsaida and he died (either by being crucified upside down or by beheading or possibly from being hung upside down from a tree) up in what is now Turkey sometime in the late first century. Surprisingly enough in 2011 “archeologists” claimed to have found his tomb in Hierapolis. As they say; Investigations are ongoing.

The church of San Filippo e Giacomo from the Via San Biagio dei Librai 

Naples - San Lorenzo Maggiore

Piazza Gaetano and San Lorenzo Maggiore

Right at the intersection of the Via Tribunale and the Via San Gregorio Armeno in the Piazza San Gaetano the church of San Lorenzo is yet another superb example of baroque architecture. At least from the outside, sort of. In any case It is one of those brightly colored highly decorated mid 18th century façades that appears out of nowhere, wedged in a corner attached to a six story block of flats on the left and a very large bell tower to the right that forms the edge of the Via San Gregorio Armeno.

The façade is divided into two levels; on the bottom level four be-swagged composite pilasters divide it into three bays. Two tremendously large  statues flank an ancient Gothic pointed portal. Each is within its own square niche, set above graffiti level and capped with a bas relief of a couple of popes tiaras and the keys of St. Peter.

On the second level bass reliefs are set between smaller composite pilasters on either side of a extremely large octagonal window. Above all of this a unique break-fronted semi broken pediment with a round oculus window. On top of all of that it is orange, which makes me happy. I like orange.

The interior has been heavily restored back to its Gothic roots. The unique (at least among churches in Naples) apse is of French inspiration and rather remarkable piece of stark Gothic architecture in a city of such over exuberant decoration.

The square itself is rather fascinating. Standing on the site of the ancient Greek and later Roman forum, it has been the center of Naples for some 2400 years. Named for the tomb of San Gaetano which is inside the church of San Paolo Maggiore. The buildings even mark where the ancient buildings were. San Lorenzo Maggiore is over the ancient temple of Castor and Pollux, while San Paolo Maggiore was built over the site of the ancient Curia of Naples. There is a a statue of San Gaetano in the square, he looks quite ecstatic. Though not quite sure why? He battled against the church of Rome in the 16th century, trying to reform corruption and greed. Eventually he died of exhaustion and grief in 1547 after saying some rather profound words on his death bed.

San Lorenzo Maggiore, Gothic portal and baroque additions