Description
The Church of Santa Caterina a Formiello is one of the most interesting Renaissance churches in Naples, in Piazza Enrico De Nicola, next to Porta Capuana and Castel Capuano. Inside it keeps the relics of the Martyrs of Otranto, a famous dome and a presbytery full of noble tombs.
The name comes from the Latin ad formis, "by the conduits": this is where the ancient Bolla aqueduct entered the city. In 1499 King Frederick of Aragon entrusted the little church to the Dominicans, who rebuilt it from scratch in the Renaissance style, with clear Tuscan influences.
The interior has a single nave with five chapels on each side. The dome, rising on a tall drum, is frescoed in the pendentives by Luigi Garzi; on the vault, Garzi painted the Mystic Marriage of Saint Catherine, and the Martyrdom of the saint is on the inner façade.
In the fourth chapel on the left, the Chapel of the Martyrs of Otranto, 240 relics rest beneath an altar of polychrome marble, some of the skulls almost intact. They are the remains of those killed by the Turks on August 14, 1480 for refusing to renounce their faith.
The presbytery was the chapel of the Spinelli, princes of Cariati: six funerary monuments carved between 1570 and 1590, with an elegant marble backdrop on either side of the high altar. In the transept, the Rosary altar has a group in alabaster and marble recalling the victory of Lepanto over the Ottomans.
In the apse some wooden choir stalls from 1566, by Benvenuto Tortelli, remain. In the middle of the nave a slab with four women at prayer opens the way to the crypt, where you can still make out the skeletons of two women with rosaries in their hands.
Outside, the marble portal with the statue of the saint is by Francesco Antonio Picchiatti, from 1659, and on the churchyard stands the shrine of San Gennaro, made between 1706 and 1708. Inside, the eighteenth century added Baroque frescoes and sculptures without touching the church's Renaissance lines.
The relics of the martyrs arrived in Naples in 1492, at the wish of Alfonso II, and have had no peace since: moved from church to church, then from chapel to chapel, they found their final place only in 1901.
Canon Celano wrote in 1724 that the dome "was in those times regarded as a marvel, being the first ever built in this our city". In 1806 Murat suppressed the convent, later turned into a military wool mill.
Don't miss
• The Chapel of the Martyrs of Otranto.
• The dome.
• The wooden stalls in the apse.
• The Spinelli presbytery.
• The Rosary altar.
Did you know?
• In the crypt beneath the nave lie the skeletons of two women clutching a rosary.
• After 1815 the convent became a military wool mill, and its chimneys still form a singular monument of industrial archaeology.
The name comes from the Latin ad formis, "by the conduits": this is where the ancient Bolla aqueduct entered the city. In 1499 King Frederick of Aragon entrusted the little church to the Dominicans, who rebuilt it from scratch in the Renaissance style, with clear Tuscan influences.
The interior has a single nave with five chapels on each side. The dome, rising on a tall drum, is frescoed in the pendentives by Luigi Garzi; on the vault, Garzi painted the Mystic Marriage of Saint Catherine, and the Martyrdom of the saint is on the inner façade.
In the fourth chapel on the left, the Chapel of the Martyrs of Otranto, 240 relics rest beneath an altar of polychrome marble, some of the skulls almost intact. They are the remains of those killed by the Turks on August 14, 1480 for refusing to renounce their faith.
The presbytery was the chapel of the Spinelli, princes of Cariati: six funerary monuments carved between 1570 and 1590, with an elegant marble backdrop on either side of the high altar. In the transept, the Rosary altar has a group in alabaster and marble recalling the victory of Lepanto over the Ottomans.
In the apse some wooden choir stalls from 1566, by Benvenuto Tortelli, remain. In the middle of the nave a slab with four women at prayer opens the way to the crypt, where you can still make out the skeletons of two women with rosaries in their hands.
Outside, the marble portal with the statue of the saint is by Francesco Antonio Picchiatti, from 1659, and on the churchyard stands the shrine of San Gennaro, made between 1706 and 1708. Inside, the eighteenth century added Baroque frescoes and sculptures without touching the church's Renaissance lines.
The relics of the martyrs arrived in Naples in 1492, at the wish of Alfonso II, and have had no peace since: moved from church to church, then from chapel to chapel, they found their final place only in 1901.
Canon Celano wrote in 1724 that the dome "was in those times regarded as a marvel, being the first ever built in this our city". In 1806 Murat suppressed the convent, later turned into a military wool mill.
Don't miss
• The Chapel of the Martyrs of Otranto.
• The dome.
• The wooden stalls in the apse.
• The Spinelli presbytery.
• The Rosary altar.
Did you know?
• In the crypt beneath the nave lie the skeletons of two women clutching a rosary.
• After 1815 the convent became a military wool mill, and its chimneys still form a singular monument of industrial archaeology.