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Between the highest part of the city and the Camaldoli hill, dominated by the hustle and bustle of passersby and tourists in the center of Naples, lies Materdei. a true open-air museum ideal for those eager for art and culture with a discovery at every turn.
Materdei is divided into an older area downstream and a more recent area upstream, built after World War II. Let's discover together the places you can visit in the famous neighborhood.
Piazzetta Materdei is the beating heart of the entire neighborhood, located between the street of the same name, Vico Medici, Calata Fontanella and Salita Porteria a San Raffaele, between the lower part of Naples and Vomero. It takes its name from the ancient Renaissance church Santa Maria Materdei and is the epicenter of cultural life in the area.
The Complex of Santa Maria di Materdei is a convent structure founded by Fr. Augustine de Juliis of the Servite Order in 1587, modified and expanded over the centuries. In 1728 Tagliacozzi Canale carried out an intervention in the Baroque style, and in 1777 the church was almost completely renovated. Here one could find splendid canvases such as theSolimena's Addolorata and the Holy Family by Lorenzo Caro.
In the 19th century there was the first suppression of the orders and the complex became a barracks: the canvases were lost and the church was abandoned. Only in 1852 was it reopened for worship and further remodeled, taking on the appearance we see today. The Cloister, on the other hand, was purchased by the Daughters of Charity who turned it into a girls' boarding school, now the site of a school.
The Fontanelle Cemetery is an important piece of the soul of Naples: when a Neapolitan experiences a difficult situation, he turns to the souls in Purgatory to ask for a grace.
It is located in Fontanelle Street and originated as a Greek necropolis but was later turned into a Christian cemetery, and the yellow tuff quarries on the hill of Materdei present in the area were also used to give dignified burial to those who could not afford it.
In 1656 the great plague struck the Kingdom of Naples, and in 1836 there was cholera. The plague generated an apocalyptic scenario with corpses scattered around the city, garbage and various diseases spreading rapidly, and it was at these times that the place was most used as a repository for corpses. The use of the quarries made it possible to remove the dead from the city and take the right measures to eradicate the plague as well, but due to the practically nonexistent sewage system one day the quarry flooded the remains were brought to the surface, creating a gruesome spectacle, so it was decided to give the bones a disposition by building an altar and officially recognizing the quarry as an ossuary.
Here a special ritual, called the rite of the pezzentelle souls: the adoption and accommodation in exchange for protection of a skull, called shawl, to which corresponded an abandoned soul called the pezzentella. Devotees would choose a skull, clean it, build a little altar with candles and rosaries, and begin to pray for the chosen soul who came to them in dreams asking for prayers to ease the pains of purgatory in exchange for a grace. If the grace came, the skull was placed in a more protected place: a tin box, glass cases or actual loculi for those who could afford it. If the pardon did not come, the skull returned along with all the others and was tried with another one. Tradition has it that when the spirit performs the pardon, the skull begins to sweat, thus indicating its intercession in the world of the living.
Founded by Umberto Raucci and Carlo Santamaria in 1992, it was previously located in Santa Maria la Nova Square but in 2004 it was moved to the area of the National Archaeological Museum of Naples and the Museum of Capodimonte. The gallery's goal is to focus on new artistic languages and experimentation in contemporary art through the work of young international emerging artists, but it has also turned its attention to some artists of the previous generation who are reference points for critics and young artists alike.
In Fontanelle Street, a stone's throw from the cemetery and catacombs is theAquaquilla of the Pozzaro, a bass through which one takes a mysterious journey bordering the world of the living and the dead in the underground of Naples.
Vincenzo Galiero, owner of the bass, one day discovers this treasure under his feet: tunnels and ancient pools used as cisterns and wells. Today he is the one who guides visitors to discover legends and superstitions.
The name Acquaquiglia del Pozzaro comes from an ancient fountain from the 1500s near the Church of Santa Maria la Nova Where the water was called Aquilia o Acquaquilia. This water poured into another fountain, that of the Little Pier, in a shell-shaped basin called a quaquilia, hence the name Aquaquilla.
So many artifacts from everyday life to take a journey into the daily life of the past, from bus tickets to late 19th century sanitary ware and American souvenirs from 1944, all the history of Naples encased in four walls.
It is located in the temporary headquarters of the House of the Scugnizzo in Materdei and Gaetano Bonelli is the founder who has been collecting objects related to the history of Naples for years.
Founded in 1759 at the behest of Marco Celentano and Michele Lignola, Via Amato di Montecassino is home to the Church of St. Raphael, the patron saint of fishermen.
The facade is divided into two orders connected by volutes and crowned by a triangular tympanum, and the interior is Greek cross, lengthened longitudinally by the entrance hall and the apse area. The dome is set directly on the central space without a drum and ends with a lantern that gives much interior illumination. The painter Angelo Mozzillo realized in the low vaults of the church two works, Tobias and Sara in Tobi's house and thearchangel Raphael.
Inside the church is a statue of the archangel Raphael, depicting the saint with two fish, a reference to the biblical episode in which young Tobias must cross a river but a fish prevents him from doing so and the archangel comes to his aid and captures him, so Tobias crosses the river and marries his beloved Sarah.
This story gave rise to an archaic tradition: girls who do not have husbands or women expecting children are invited to kiss the saint's fish as a good omen, a ritual that combines the sacred and the profane. Even today it is still said Go pot the fish and San Rafael when its anniversary is celebrated on October 24, words with predictable double meanings.
Monumental church founded in 1743 by Fr. Francis Pepe, along with a conservatory for girls, headed by an ordinary royal magistrate and considered one of the best at the time.
The church has a single hall with three small side chapels, and the high altar is remarkable. In the courtyard of the conservatory was originally the Immaculata Spire attributed to Giuseppe Astarita, today in Via ugo Falcanco. Today, unfortunately, the church cannot be visited.
The Cor Jesu Church, also called the Church of the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus or even the Church of Jesus in the Garden of Olives is located between the Church of the Conception and the Church of St. Raphael in Materdei.
Father Ludovico da Casoria, the saint of charity, purchased the Conception female boarding school and turned it into the headquarters of the Opera degli Accattoncelli e delle Accattoncelle, a church completed in 1886. Today's structure is a 20th-century reconstruction whose facade is divided into two orders: in the center of the lower order is the portal with a neo-Gothic argo inside which is a bas-relief of Jesus suffering in the Garden of Gethsemane; the upper order has two pairs of Doric pilasters with a central rose window.
Another monumental church of Naples in the district Materdei, was founded in the early 17th century as a vow of Captain D. Andrea d'Aragona, a local resident. Modified during the next century, today the nave is elevated to the street, and in the hypogeum the stone ornaments of the crypt window feature skulls. On the high altar we find a canvas by the Italian painter Lorenzo de Caro while on the two side ones are wooden statues of Our Lady of Sorrows and St. Pompilius.
On Matteo Renato Imbriani Street stands the Monastery of St. Ephraem New founded in 1572 on a fund of Gianfrancesco di Sangro, prince of Sansevero. The Capuchin friars acquired it thanks to donations from the noblewoman Fabrizia Carafa and created an impressive complex there: 160 rooms for the monks, two cloisters, courtyards, vegetable gardens and common areas. Near the Monastery is the church of the same name founded in 1661.
In 1840 a fire destroyed almost everything; a statue of St. Francis of Assisi by Giuseppe Sammartino and a statue of the Madonna from Brazil were saved. King Ferdinand II of the Two Sicilies had it restored in no time, and as early as 1841 it was reopened.
From 1925 the monastery underwent major changes, becoming a criminal asylum and in 1975 a judicial psychiatric hospital later transferred to the Naples Penitentiary Center-Secondigliano.
Left to its own devices, in 2015 the Naples University Autorganized Collective created theFormer OPG Occupied Je so 'crazy To return one of its assets to the city.
Monumental palace in Naples on Salita San Raffaele, formerly a hunting lodge, became a residence in the mid-18th century under Prince Joseph Mary of Aragon.
It is thought to have been designed by Ferdinando Sanfelice who died at the beginning of the work, which was then entrusted to his collaborator Giuseppe Astarita.
It is located in an area of difficult access where a steep slope leads to a round-headed piperno portal. Past the entrance is the first courtyard and then the second features an octagonal matrix staircase, unusual for the Neapolitan style.
In 1785 it was restored by architect Gaetano Barba: many Baroque decorations were removed giving the palace a more classical style.
In 1906 it was purchased by the Sisters of Our Lady of Sorrows who built in the garden the Church of Our Lady of Sorrows in eclectic stie with a neoclassical-neo-Renaissance facade.
A wonderful contemporary art museum, the Morra House: houses the Morra Collection, over two thousand works by internationally renowned artists.
In Piazzetta Materdei, opposite the convent of the Servite Fathers and the Church of Santa Maria di Materdei is the Medici Palace. It was built in the first half of the 17th century at the behest of an important member of the Florentine Medici family and expanded in the 17th century.
It is a splendid example of a magnate house with an interior staircase embellished with decorations and frescoes in the vaults that still has steps and staircase leaders made of piperno. At that time an authentic picture gallery was found in the palace with important paintings such as the Holy Family by Raphael.
In the upper part of the district, Palazzo Scipione Ammirato is a square dedicated to the 16th-century historian, which was completely redeveloped in 2003 with the design of architect and designer Alessandro Mendini, who turned it into a pedestrian zone. In the center of the square is an obelisk of stained glass and in the opposite direction a fascinating sculpture of Luigi Serafini, Carpe Diem.
It dates back to the 16th century and was completely redone in 1734 by Giovan Battista Nauclerio, who transformed it in Baroque style. He created a back garden and an open staircase between the courtyard and the garden.
The façade is very simple with a sixteenth-century portal in piperno, crowned by a newer top floor and small courtyard gives access to the three-arched staircase in the Sanfelician style.
On Via Materdei on the edge of the historic center is Palazzo Ruvo, originally the palatial home of Giuseppe Ruvo, who had it restored in the second half of the 18th century.
The portal has two ashlar piers on which rest two corbels with volutes decorated with naturalistic elements, surmounted by anthropomorphic masks. In the middle part a cornice has its two sides a round arch, in the side lunettes there are floral elements, and the upper cornice forms the balcony of the noble apartment.
The hallway is covered by a cross vault, and through it there is access to the small courtyard onto which the galleries face. The staircase is built around a central quadrangular room with three flights, and the whole structure discharges on pairs of curvilinear pillars tapered from bottom to top with pseudocapitals with rounded corners.
The Spire of the Immaculate Conception is one of the Spires of Naples and dates back to the 18th century: it was attributed to Joseph Astarita, 10 meters high, made of white marble and piperno with the typical features of Baroque art and the statue of the Madonna crowning it. The statue is said to date from 1470 and depicts the Madonna in a well-designed robe holding the child Jesus and clutches a sphere in his right hand that suggests Earth.
Today in Materdei there is only a copy of the original work, kept in the City Museum of Castel Nuovo.
Its origins are controversial: some say it was used as a model for the more famous spire in Piazza del Gesù Nuovo, commissioned by Jesuit Father Francesco Pepe, others that the statue belonged to the Renaissance Palazzo Sanseverino and only in the eighteenth century was it moved there, and still others that the statue was located a chapel in the area before being placed on the spire.
The Eneolithic tombs of Materdei are the oldest artificial cavities so far discovered in the underground of Naples dating to the 3rd millennium B.C. They were used as burial places by family clans of warrior origin.
They were discovered by chance when excavation was taking place in 1950 in Vico Neve in a garden of a building to construct a building: the first tomb on April 11, with an intact body huddled inside; the second on April 15, inside which there were also vases and a dagger.
The Materdei district is well-connected thanks to the Naples Metro Line 1 station, and according to the British newspaper The Daily Telegraph, it ranked as the 16th most beautiful metro station in Europe.
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