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Palazzo Venezia represents one of the most important buildings in the city centre and it is unique.

Palazzo Venezia presents a magnificent loggia, a so called “casina pompeiana” and one splendid historic garden, and it has a remarkable history. Because of this particular “verzura”, many researchers have dedicated their work to it and have underlined the paradigmatic character of the garden of Palazzo Venezia, as if it were a model in which it is possible to find the principal characteristics of Neapolitan gardens.

The tuff bank where most of the gardens install, pierced by thousands of tunnels and grottos, represents the union between the vegetation and the foundation area of the Cuban city, which extends itself on the highest point of a plateau with natural, degrading terraces form Sant’Aniello to Caponapoli till  Monterone and it is surrounded by boundary walls which follow the conformation of the soil.

The hanging garden of Palazzo Venezia in Via Benedetto Croce is a testimony of this condition. It presents still a marked  inclination on the massive tuff bank crossed by artificial cavities  which connect the courtyard, the apartment and the garden with its orientation towards the near convent of San Domenico Maggiore, which is influenced by the presence of Greek walls along the Western side of the Church. It is an important garden because it expresses all the most important elements of the gardens of the old city centre, in spite of all the transformation it has undergone.

The building to which it belongs was named by Croce “il napoletano di Venezia”. It is possible to build the story starting form 1412, when king Ladislao d’Angiò Durazzo donates it to the Venetian Republic after having taken it from the family Sanseverino di Matera, but it has been proven its 14^th century origin. It became so the diplomatic centre of Venice and the residence of its representatives. The 16^th century cartography of Jan Van Stinemolen documents realistically the original aspect with only one floor facing inferior decumanus while the backside opens on a wide natural area characterised by its soil characteristics.

The small dimensions of the present garden is the consequence of the progressive widening of palace Brancaccio, now Filomarino, which still in 1756 – as it is reminded by a commemorative plaque on the border – obtained, by the Venetian republic, an additional portion to build a new wing.

After the numerous variations of the design, the geometric implant, still present in the plans of  the duke of Noja ( 1775), was transformed into a romantic garden with curvilinear flowerbeds in the 19^th century; they have been simplified now in comparison with the ones of the plan of Schiavoni (1877).

During the sencond decade of the 19^th century, the jurist Capone bought the place by the Austrian government and realised a building with apsis between the loggia and the garden. In this way, the area was brought back to its original condition. The building of a coffee-house in Pompeian style increases the enjoyment, emphasising the intimacy and isolation. It is not a casualty that the model desired by the new owner has connections with Roman architecture and so the garden reacquired its classical taste. On the temple there is a Latin inscription which evokes an atmosphere partially perceivable and the values embodied by the place: “ CARA DOMUS SED UBIHORTULUS ALTER ACCESSIT QUANTO CARIOR ES DOMINO NUNC ET ADESSE AT ABESSE FORO NUNC TEMPORE EODEM VIVERE MI RURI VIVERE IN URBE LICET A.1818 “ ( For a long time you have dear to me, home, but  since a vegetable garden has been added you have become even more dear for your owner and now I can take part to public life or isolate myself and live on the countryside in the city”).

The garden of Palazzo Venezia is unique because of the presence of all the characteristics of Neapolitan garden in the same place. […]”.

Quotations form Maria Luisa Margiotta, Pasquale Belfiore, Ornella Zerlenga, “Giardini storici napoletani”, Electa, 2000 cit.p.14 e ss.,

Photo and text source, https://thesooper.it/napoli/luoghi-da-scoprire-a-napoli/ville-palazzi-castelli/palazzo-venezia/, http://www.palazzovenezianapoli.com/?page_id=21

This post is also available in: Italiano (Italian)