Castel del Monte is situated on a kind of limestone plateau, sudden, isolated, majestic, mysterious, 18 km from Andria, Puglia in the sun.
shape and position make him an imposing presence and vaguely disturbing that seems to hide between its ancient stones dark secrets.
The documents relating to its construction are scarce; archives we deliver a letter sent in 1240 by Emperor Frederick II Hohenstaufen to Death captains, Riccardo Montefusco, so provvedesse operations paving the castle. The design of the castle is free of paternity even though some hand glimpse of Nicola Pisano, the other by Richard of Lentini and others argue that to design the building was the same Frederick II.
still do not know the purpose for which the mansion was built as it differs from all other buildings coeval. Is called "castle" in the absence of other, more appropriate, and in fact the first mpressione is the one that provides better but if we look we see that there is no gap, there are traces of battlements on the terraces, the gate 's Admission is poorly positioned to defend. Almost certainly it was a building of the court (some have called a hunting lodge) that draws some Islamic buildings of the time but when you consider its isolation, we realize that this hypothesis is proved weak.
With the decline of imperial power, the castle underwent the same events passing into the hands of various feudal lords.
In 1528 it was bombarded by French artillery Odet de Foix.
was later used as a shelter by nobles during the plague epidemics of the seventeenth century as the seat of the survivors who escaped the Jacobin revolution in 1799.
In 1876 it was bought by the state for 25,000 Pounds and subjected to a series of restoration and recovery.
Since 1996 he has become part of the heritage dellUmanità, elevated to that rank by UNESCO.
This castle has the shape of an octagonal prism top 40 and 20 meters wide. The corners are equipped with eight octagonal towers 8 feet wide, and the octagonal courtyard is also a width of 17 meters and inside there was always an octagonal pool.
The building is divided into two floors, each of which has eight rooms trapezoidal Castle, until 1897 was surrounded by a curtain octagon. E ', essentially, the celebration of number eight and more or less esoteric meanings associated with that number.
A bunch of scholars he is amused to find analogies, symbolism, similarities, peculiarities mathematics, astronomy, geometry and connections in many fields of human knowledge.
Aldo Tavolaro The scholar argues that the unique building was designed as an "emblem of a material fine and vast knowledge." The castle would be a colossal gnomon solar .
not expect to find inside the castle, and lavishly furnished frescoed rooms. The hardships suffered by the old building we deliver the bare but rich in character. The portal is perhaps the most "artistic", combining Gothic and classical elements.
accessing the manor we find something incomprehensible from the entrance hall of a person must have access to a side room and only you can access it from the central courtyard from which a compulsory route takes us to visit other environments.
If we are careful, we will notice other details that "ruin" the geometric perfection of this masterpiece. For example, not all towers have spiral staircases for access to upper floors
and those that have are not symmetrical, yet, on the first floor the rooms are lit by windows that are sometimes mullioned
and sometimes at bay.
In the rooms we can only mention some beautiful fanlights and shelves adorned with heads of satyrs. Room on the eighth floor (the last one that meets visiting environments counterclockwise from the entrance) are the few remains of a mosaic floor. The original design, as can be seen, it consisted of a square "magic" in the center and surrounded by six-pointed stars resulting from the superposition of two equilateral triangles, one with the top facing up (representing the sun, fire, and humans) and with a summit in the bottom (the moon, water, and the woman). These stars of David are also called "seals of Solomon." It seems that by visiting this room, many people who are particularly sensitive, have been hit by mysterious sicknesses. After having recorded my "insensitivity" to the magic stars, and then be released unharmed from such environments, I climb up to the terrace (recently remade) from which you can enjoy the beautiful landscape of the Murge to Gargano.
