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Santa Maria del Carmine, Naples

13th-century Roman Catholic church buildings in ItalyBasilica churches in Naples
Santa Maria del Carmine Maggiore (Naples)
Santa Maria del Carmine Maggiore (Naples)

Santa Maria del Carmine (Our Lady of Mount Carmel) is a church in Naples, Italy. It is at one end of Piazza Mercato (Market Square), the centre of civic life in Naples for many centuries until it was cut off from the rest of the city by urban renewal in 1900. The church was founded in the 13th century by Carmelite friars driven from the Holy Land in the Crusades, presumably arriving in the Bay of Naples aboard Amalfitan ships. Some sources, however, place the original refugees from Mount Carmel as early as the eighth century. The church is still in use and the 75–metre bell tower is visible from a distance even amidst taller modern buildings. The square adjacent to the church was the site in 1268 of the execution of Conradin, the last Hohenstaufen heir to the throne of the kingdom of Naples, at the hands of Charles I of Anjou, thus beginning the Angevin reign of the kingdom. Conrad's mother, Elisabeth of Bavaria, founded the church for the good of the souls of her young son and his companion, Frederick of Baden as well as a resting place for their remains, where they remain today. A statue was erected to Conrad's memory, commissioned by then crown-prince, Maximilian II of Bavaria, designed by the Neoclassic sculptor Thorvaldsen, and completed by his pupil Schopf in 1847. In 1647 the square was the site of battles between rebels and royal troops during Masaniello's revolt, and later, in 1799, it was the scene of the mass execution of leaders of the Neapolitan Republic of 1799. The area – including parts of the church premises – was heavily bombed in World War II and still shows the scars of the devastation. The old monastic grounds adjacent to the church now serve as a shelter for the needy and homeless. The church is home to two renowned religious relics: one, the painting of the "Brown Madonna" (Italian: Madonna Bruna), is said to have been brought by the original Carmelites; the second is a figure of the Crucifixion in which the crown of thorns is missing. According to legend, the crown fell off as Christ's head moved when the building was struck by a cannonball in 1439 during the Aragonese siege.

Excerpt from the Wikipedia article Santa Maria del Carmine, Naples (License: CC BY-SA 3.0, Authors, Images).

Santa Maria del Carmine, Naples
Via del Carmine, Naples Mercato

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Geographical coordinates (GPS)

Latitude Longitude
N 40.846814 ° E 14.267583 °
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Basilica Santuario di Santa Maria del Carmine Maggiore

Via del Carmine
80142 Naples, Mercato
Campania, Italy
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Santa Maria del Carmine Maggiore (Naples)
Santa Maria del Carmine Maggiore (Naples)
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Santa Maria la Scala
Santa Maria la Scala

Santa Maria la Scala is a Baroque style church in a Piazzetta of the same name in Naples, Italy. The complex was built in 1054, when merchants of the town of Scala in the peninsula of Sorrento, traded with Neapolitans, thus were granted a plot which then stood outside the city walls, to erect a church complex. By the 15th century, the church stood inside the walls of the city. As trade between Naples and Scala declined, the church fell in disuse. The church was reconstructed in the 17th and 18th century as the home of various lay and religious confraternities. The interior is decorated in an elaborate Baroque style. In the 19th century, the church was restored by the architect Francesconi. The interior was redecorated by Lorenzo De Caro. Among those buried in the church are men who were faithful to the Bourbon Monarchy, and who were arrested on June 13, 1799, and the next day executed on the grounds of Capodimonte by a firing squad set up by the Neapolitan Republic of 1799. The executed were Antonio di Lieto, Carloantonio Genovese, Saverio Greco, Carmine Ruggiero, Antonio Russo, and Francesco Vigliotto. Among the interior decorations are a number of paintings from the school of Solimena. Next to the sacristy is an altarpiece depicting St Matthew by Antonio Pascucci. The canvases in the second and third chapels on the right, depicting Madonnas with Saints Francis and John the Baptist, and with Saints Anthony and Phillip were painted by Nicola de Mattheis. The third chapel also has a canvas depicting the Resurrection by Paolillo, a pupil of Andrea di Salerno. The first chapel on the right has a St Anthony by the school of Massimo Stanzione.