Page 64 - (DK Eyewitness) Travel Guide - Italian Riviera

62  GENO A AREA B Y AREA

r Santa Maria di Cappella del
Castello Battistero is a
sarcophagus of
Salita Santa Maria di Castello 15. Roman origin.
Map 5 B4. Tel 010 254 95 11. The apse, the chapels
Open Church & Museum: 9:30– and the dome are
12:30am, 3:30–6:30pm daily. the result of changes
made from the 15th
This church rises on the site to the 18th centuries.
of the Roman castrum, or fort, In the chapel in the
around which the earliest parts left transept is a
of the city were constructed. Virgin with the saints
Among the most illustrious of Catherine and Mary
old Genoese churches, it was Magdalen and the
built in the 12th century on effigies of St Dominic
the site of an earlier place of by Giovanni Bene-
worship, at a time when detto Castiglione
Romanesque buildings were (known as il
appearing all over the city. Grechetto, 1616–70).
In the mid-15th century The high altar has a The frescoed façade of Palazzo San Giorgio
the church was entrusted to splendid late 17th-
the Dominicans, who added century marble u Palazzo San
monastic buildings, including sculpture of the Assumption. Giorgio
three cloisters. The latters’ Among the monastic
decoration was commissioned buildings, the second cloister is Via della Mercanzia 2. Map 5 B3.
by the Grimaldi family (in line of special note. Here, the lower Tel 010 241 26 25/27 54. Open phone
with the huge increase in of the two loggias, the Loggia to check opening hours of exhibitions,
private patronage at that time dell’Annunciazione, features or ask at the tourist office.
in Genoa), who turned the com- roundels with Sibyls and Prophets
plex into a point of reference for (15th century) in its vault, and a This palazzo is traditionally
artists in the city. In the centu- charming fresco of the Annunci- identified as the place in which
ries to follow, other aristo cratic ation by Justus von Ravensburg, Marco Polo was imprisoned
families commissioned the signed and dated 1451. following the Battle of Curzola
decoration of the church’s There is a small museum, (between the Venetians and the
side chapels. with works such as Paradise Genoese) in 1298. While here,
The stone façade is crowned and The Conversion of Polo met a writer from Pisa
by a cornice of blind arches. The St Paul by Ludovico called Rustichello, with
central doorway incorporates a Brea (1513); whom he joined
Roman architrave, and there are an Immaculate forces after their
other Roman elements inside: Conception, release to write
several of the Corinthian capitals a wooden Il Milione (“The
which adorn the red granite sculpture by Travels”). The
columns in the nave came from Maragliano (18th palazzo is
Roman buildings, and in the century); and a made up of two
Madonna and distinct parts: a
Child by Barnaba medieval part
da Modena Detail of the façade of Palazzo turned towards
(14th century). San Giorgio the city, which
Next to the was built in 1260
church stands as the seat of the government
the 12th-century Torre (the Capitani del Popolo) and
degli Embriaci, evidence later became the Banco di San
of the medieval power of the Giorgio (1407); and a second
aristocratic Embriaci family, part, a huge 16th-century
who lived in this quarter. extension built to overlook the
port. The fresco decoration on
the latter’s façade (1606–8), by
t Porto Antico Lazzaro Tavarone, was discovered
only during restoration work in
See pp64–5.
the 1990s.
The expansion of the
y Aquarium palazzo, which involved major
The Loggia dell’Annunciazione, Santa Maria restructuring of the medieval
di Castello See pp66–7. section (later heavily restored
For hotels and restaurants in this area see p180 and pp188–9

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