page_title: Castel Nuovo
section_title: Hall of the Barons
hierarchical_section_title: Castel Nuovo / Description / Hall of the Barons
caption_attribution_description: English: Castel_Nuovo ( New Castle ) in Naples ItalyItaliano: Napoli, Castel nuovo: scarpa della Torre del Beverello
context_page_description: Castel Nuovo, often called Maschio Angioino, is a medieval castle located in front of Piazza Municipio and the city hall in central Naples, Campania, Italy. Its scenic location and imposing size makes the castle, first erected in 1279, one of the main architectural landmarks of the city. It was a royal seat for kings of Naples, Aragon and Spain until 1815.
  It is the headquarters of Neapolitan Society of Homeland History and of the Naples Committee of the Institute for the History of the Italian Risorgimento. In the complex there is also the civic museum, which includes the Palatine Chapel and the museum paths on the first and second floors.
context_section_description: (Sala dei Baroni) The Hall of the Barons, originally called the Throne Room, is the main hall (sala Maior) of the Castel Nuovo. It was commissioned by Robert, King of Naples who, for the occasion, called Giotto di Bondone to paint a cycle of frescoes, around 1330. Evidence of this cycle today is known only by its mention in a collection of sonnets by an anonymous author dating back to 1350. The frescoes depicted the illustrious men and women of antiquity: Samson, Hercules, Solomon, Paris, Hector, Achilles, Aeneas, Alexander the Great and Julius Caesar, with their "companions".
  Under the Aragonese dominion, more precisely of Alfonso V of Aragon (1442 - 1458), the hall was rebuilt by Guillem Sagrera who enlarged it the spaces and the dimensions.
  The hall is called the Hall of the Barons because around 1487 Ferdinand I of Naples invited some of the barons who had conspired against him to this place, with the excuse of celebrating his nephew's wedding. In reality this was nothing but a trap; the barons that were present were arrested and immediately put to death.
  Located at the corner of the Tower of Beverello, between the northern side and the eastern side, facing the sea, the large room (26 m x 28 m) is covered by an octagonal vault resting on large angular ébrasement and equipped with sixteen ogive forming a star pattern with a bright oculus in the center. Around the dome there are small windows that served soldiers to watch over the person of the king when he received visits or ambassadors. Access to this position of the hall was possible through the helical scale (Catalan staircase) in piperno and in tuff stone, located in the adjacent Tower of Beverello and also built by Guillem Sagrera, during the works that affected the whole royal environment. The floor of the room was decorated with Maiolica white and blue glazed, brought from Valencia.
  On the side facing the sea, between two crossed windows open to the outside, there is a large fireplace, surmounted by two stages for musicians.
  Among the works of art still present in the hall is the two-faced portal marble of Domenico Gagini, two bas-reliefs on which the triumphal procession of Alfonso V of Aragon is depicted and the entrance of the King in the castle, a Catalan portal through which you access the Chamber of the Angels.
  Today part of the sculptural decoration by Barcelonan Pere Johan is dispelled. Until 2006, moreover, it hosted the meetings of the City Council of Naples.
caption: Tower of the Beverello
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