Norman Palace - 4 Things to Know Before Visiting

The Palatine Chapel is the royal chapel of the Norman palace in Palermo, Sicily. This building is a mixture of Byzantine, Norman, and Fatimid architectural styles, showing the tricultural state of Sicily during the 12th century after Roger II's father and uncle conquered the island. Also referred to as a Palace church or Palace chapel, it was commissioned by Roger II of Sicily in 1132 to be built upon an older chapel constructed around 1080.

The church of San Giovanni Degli Eremiti is a national monument located in the historic center of Palermo, near the Norman Palace. The church is built according to the canons of Sicilian-Norman architecture; it is a Romanesque church and externally resembles oriental buildings. This reference to the East is even more emphasized by the bright red domes, restored in the nineteenth century by the architect Giuseppe Patricolo, according to an interpretation of the original color based on ancient tr

The Primatial Metropolitan Cathedral Basilica of the Holy Virgin Mary of the Assumption , known simply as the Cathedral Church of Palermo , is the main place of Catholic worship in the city of Palermo and the archbishopric of the homonymous metropolitan archdiocese. A feast of geometric patterns, ziggurat crenellations, maiolica cupolas and blind arches, Palermo's cathedral has suffered aesthetically from multiple reworkings over the centuries, but remains a prime example of Sicily's unique Ara

Quattro Canti is the name of an octagonal square at the intersection of the two main roads in Palermo: Via Maqueda and Cassaro, today Via Vittorio Emanuele, about half of their length. The piazza is octagonal, four sides being the streets; the remaining four sides are Baroque buildings, the near-identical facades of which contain fountains with statues of the four seasons, the four Spanish kings of Sicily, and of the patronesses of Palermo.

Il Capo is an ancient and well-known district in the historic center of Palermo ; with the same term the people of Palermo also indicate the market held there and with which the neighborhood identifies itself. The Capo market, together with the other Palermo markets such as Ballarò , La Vucciria , Lattarini and the Flea Market , is an important retail agri-food outlet.

The cathedral of San Cataldo is a church of Taranto, precisely the oldest cathedral in Puglia , initially dedicated to St. Mary Magdalene then to St. Cataldo bishop. The proposal to recognize in the succorpo the remains of the early Christian church dedicated to Santa Maria dates back to the Fago, whose existence in the seventh century was confirmed by a letter from Pope Gregory. It was built by the Byzantines in the second half of the 10th century, during the reconstruction of the city commiss