Vergini

- Porta San Gennaro, Santa Maria della Stella, via Vergini, via Cristallini, piazza Sanità, Cimitero delle Fontanelle -

T here are references to the Vergini Quarter in histories as far back as the seventeenth century. It was spoken of as a city in its own right, a "city of neighborhoods," and until 1718 developed independently of the rest of the city, mixing the spontaneous buildings of the poor, along its narrow paths and lanes, with aristocratic and religious structures. We will follow a comfortable itinerary. Starting from Porta San Gennaro (in the northern section of the Aragonese city wall), we soon reach the church of the Gesù delle Monache (the Gesù of the Nuns, formerly San Giovanni in Porta), restored by Arcangelo Guglielmelli. Crossing Via Foria, we reach Piazzetta Stella by way of Piazza Cavour. The church of Santa Maria della Stella was built in order to furnish a finer setting for an image of the Madonna della Stella ("of the Star"), which previously had been located in a small chapel near the Porta San Gennaro. Adjacent to the church is its former convent, now the Podgora Barracks. Looking out over Piazza Cavour (the former "Largo delle Pigne") is a broad structure of an irregular shape out of which emerge the church and former convent of the Rosariello alle Pigne. The building, begun in 1630, underwent renovations and transformations in 1775 and 1880. Continuing along Via Fuori Porta San Gennaro, we reach the church of Santa Maria della Misericordia (not open for visits). It is designed with a single, very long hall, and was built at the beginning of the seventeenth century to replace a sixteenth century building buried during a flood. The block facing the square, and occupying a preeminent position in the Vergini-Sanità Quarter, was for years the only access to the cemeteries outside the city walls, and contains some of the most important architectural sites in the area, such as the church of Santa Maria Succurre Miseris. This church is built around a centralized rectangular floor plan, and is composed of two superimposed churches, the first in a Gothic style, the second dating from the beginning of the eighteenth century (not open for visits). Along Via Vergini, at No. 10, is the Palazzo "dello Spagnuolo" ("the Spaniard's Palazzo"), by Ferdinando Sanfelice. On the north-east side we find Vanvitelli's church of Santa Maria dei Vergini, with the monastic complex of the Missionary Fathers, built at the beginning of the seventeenth century. Reaching Via San Severo, at the northern end of the axis formed by Via Antesaecula, we come to the church of San Severo, the work of Dionisio Lazzari, built to a rectangular floor plan. After this we encounter Palazzo Sanfelice, by Ferdinando Sanfelice, on Via Arena della Sanità. Further along, we reach Piazza di Santa Maria della Sanità, created by demolishing several palazzi, and dominated by the church of Santa Maria della Sanità. Beyond the outcrop of tufa that skirts the Valley delle Fontanelle, we find the church of the Virgin Mary of the Immaculate Conception and San Vincenzo at No. 154 Via delle Fontanelle. Passing the Sanità Bridge on the right, and taking Via San Vincenzo, we proceed toward San Gennaro extra moenia ("outside the city walls"). The earliest structure of this church (dating from the fifth century) was rebuilt in the fourteenth century when Saint Januarius's remains were triumphantly returned to Naples. Continuing along Via delle Fontanelle, we reach the excavations over which the church of Santa Maria del Carmine was built. The ossuary is a wide tufa pit, adapted to store the remains of the victims of the cholera epidemic of 1836, along with skeletons found in other locations in Naples (Via Toledo, the foundations of the Maschio Angioino, etc.). (Filomena Sardella)