Porta Nuova is a monumental

city gate A city gate is a gate which is, or was, set within a city wall. It is a type of fortified gateway. Uses City gates were traditionally built to provide a point of controlled access to and departure from a walled city for people, vehicles, goods ...

Palermo Palermo ( ; ; , locally also or ) is a city in southern Italy, the capital (political), capital of both the autonomous area, autonomous region of Sicily and the Metropolitan City of Palermo, the city's surrounding metropolitan province. The ...

. It represents the entrance of the Cassaro (the main and most ancient street of the city) from

Corso Calatafimi Corso may refer to: Places * Corso, Boumerdès, Algeria * Via del Corso, Rome, Italy Other uses * Corso (surname) * CORSO, a New Zealand aid agency * "CORSO," a song by rapper Tyler, the Creator See also * Cane Corso The Cane Corso is an I ...

(the way to

Monreale Monreale (; ; Sicilian: ''Murriali'') is a town and ''comune'' in the Metropolitan City of Palermo, in Sicily, Southern Italy. It is located on the slope of Monte Caputo, overlooking the very fertile valley called ''"La Conca d'oro"'' (the Golde ...

) and is located beside

Palazzo dei Normanni The Palazzo dei Normanni () is also called Royal Palace of Palermo. It was the seat of the Kings of Sicily with the Hauteville dynasty and served afterwards as the main seat of power for the subsequent rulers of Sicily. Since 1946 it has been t ...

, royal palace of Palermo. The gate was built to celebrate

Charles V Charles V may refer to: Kings and Emperors * Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor (1500–1558) * Charles V of Naples (1661–1700), better known as Charles II of Spain * Charles V of France (1338–1380), called the Wise Others * Charles V, Duke ...

conquest of Tunis (1535) The conquest of Tunis occurred in 1535 when the Habsburg Emperor Charles V and his allies wrestled the city away from the control of the Ottoman Empire. Background In 1533, Suleiman the Magnificent ordered Hayreddin Barbarossa, whom he had summon ...

and his visit to the capital of the

Kingdom of Sicily The Kingdom of Sicily (; ; ) was a state that existed in Sicily and the southern Italian peninsula, Italian Peninsula as well as, for a time, in Kingdom of Africa, Northern Africa, from its founding by Roger II of Sicily in 1130 until 1816. It was ...

History

According to the historian

Tommaso Fazello Tommaso Fazello (Neo-Latin ''Fazellus'', 1498 – 8 April 1570) was an Italian Dominican friar, historian and antiquarian. He is known as the father of Sicilian history. He is the author of the first printed history of Sicily: ''De Rebus Sicu ...

the original gate was built in the 15th century. The building was initially called "Porta dell'Aquila" (Gate of the Eagle), but the people of Palermo got used to call it "''Porta Nuova''" ("''New Gate''"). After Charles V's conquest of Tunis, the Emperor came to Sicily. He entered in Palermo through this gate on 13 September 1535. In order to commemorate this event, the Senate of Palermo decreed to rebuild the gate in a more sumptuous style. The

Viceroy of Sicily A viceroy () is an official who reigns over a polity in the name of and as the representative of the monarch of the territory. The term derives from the Latin prefix ''vice-'', meaning "in the place of" and the Anglo-Norman ''roy'' (Old Frenc ...

Marcantonio Colonna Marcantonio II Colonna (sometimes spelled Marc'Antonio; 1535 – August 1, 1584), Duke of Tagliacozzo and Duke and Prince of Paliano, was an Italian aristocrat who served as Viceroy of Sicily in the service of the Spanish Crown, general of ...

set off the construction in 1583. The gate was completed in 1584. The Viceroy renamed it "Porta Austriaca" (Austrian Gate). For this reason the building was also called "Porta Imperiale" (Imperial Gate). But nevertheless, the name "''Porta Nuova''" continues to be used. The gate was destroyed in 1667 when a fire erupted inside the warehouse of the building. The Senate of Palermo commissioned the architect

Gaspare Guercio Gaspare Guercio (1611 - 1670/1679) was an Italian artist, nicknamed 'Guercio' and a major proponent of the Sicilian Baroque. He was principally a sculptor but also a designer of decorative schemes for architectural projects. He collaborated wi ...

to rebuild the gate. The work was completed in 1669.

Description

The facade leading to the Cassaro has the typical style of the

triumphal arches A triumphal arch is a free-standing monumental structure in the shape of an archway with one or more arched passageways, often designed to span a road, and usually standing alone, unconnected to other buildings. In its simplest form, a triumphal ...

. The facade leading to the Corso Calatifimi and Piazza Indipendenza presents four big

telamones In European architectural sculpture, an atlas (also known as an atlant, or atlante or atlantid; plural atlantes)''Aru-Az ...

depicting the

Moors The term Moor is an Endonym and exonym, exonym used in European languages to designate the Muslims, Muslim populations of North Africa (the Maghreb) and the Iberian Peninsula (particularly al-Andalus) during the Middle Ages. Moors are not a s ...

defeated by Charles V.

References

External links

* {{in lang, it}
History of the gate - Provincia Regionale di Palermo
Nuova Baroque architecture in Palermo Triumphal arches in Italy