Salerno

Map of Italy showing Salerrno southeast of Naples

Salerno is a town and a province capital in Campania, south-western Italy, located on the gulf of the same name on the Tyrrhenian Sea.

The main town of the "Costiera Amalfitana" (the part of coast on the Tyrrhenian sea which includes famous towns like Amalfi, Positano, etc.), it is mostly known in recent history for having hosted the king of Italy, who escaped from Rome in 1943 after Italy negotiated a peace with the Allies in World War II. A brief so-called "government of the South" was then established in the town. Some of the Allied landings during Operation Avalanche (the invasion of Italy) occurred near Salerno.

Salerno seen from the hills overlooking the city.

History

Pre-Roman times

the area of what is now Salerno was settled since pre-historical times, although the first certain news about the human presence date to 9th-6th centuries BC: we know the Samnites-Etruscans city of Irna, situated across the Irno river, in the today's Salernitan quarter of Fratte. This settlement represented an important base for the Etruscan trades with the Greek colonies of Posidonia and Elea.

The Roman city

With the Roman advance in Campania, Irna began to lose its importance, being supplanted by the new Roman colony (194 BC) of Salernum, developing around an initial castrum. The new city, which gradually lost its military function in favour of trades, was connected to Rome by the Via Popilia, which ran towards Lucania and Reggio Calabria.

Archaeological remains, although fragmentary, suggest the idea of a florid and lively city. Under Diocletianus (late 3rd century AD) Salernum became the administrative centre of the Bruttia and Lucania province.

In the 5th century Salerno was an important center under the Ostrogoth domination of Italy.

In the following century, during the Gothic Wars, the Goths were defeated by the Byzantines, whose domination however laster lasted 15 years (from 553 to 568), up to the Lombards invaded almost the whole peninsula. Like many coastal cities of southern city (Gaeta, Sorrento, Amalfi), Salerno initially remained untouched by the newcomers, falling only in 646. It subsequently became part of the Duchy of Benevento.

The Lombard city

Under the Lombard dukes Salerno lived the most splendid period of its history.

In 774 Arechi II transferred the seat of the Duchy of Benevento to Salerno, in order to elude Charlemagne's offensive and to secure himself the control of a strategic area, the centre of coastal and internal communications in Campania.

With Arechi II, Salerno grew to great splendour, becoming a centre of studies with its famous Medical School. The Lombard prince ordered the city to be fortified; the Castle on the Bonadies mountain had already been built with walls and towers. In 839 Salerno declared independent from Benevento, becoming the capital of a flourishing principality stretching out to Capua, northern Calabria and Puglia up to Taranto.

Around the year 1000 prince Guaimar IV annexed Amalfi, Sorrento, Gaeta and the whole duchy of Puglia and Calabria, starting to conceive a future unification of the whole southern Italy under Salerno's arms. The coins minted in the city circulated in all the Mediterranean, with the Opulenta Salernum wording to certify its richness.

However, the stability of the principate was continually shaken by the Saracens attacks and, most of all, by internal struggles. In 1056, one of the numerous plots led to the fall of Guaimar. His weaker son Gisulf II succeeded him, but the begin of the decline for the principality had begun.

Salerno under Normans, Hohenstaufen, and Anjou

On December 13, 1076 the Norman conqueror Robert Guiscard, who had married Guaimar IV's daughter Sichelgaita, besieged Salerno and defeated his brother-in-law Gisulf. This act put the end to the hundreds of years of Lombard dominance, but did not stop the city's vitality. In this period the royal palace (Castel Terracena) and the magnificent Arab-Gothic style cathedral were built, and science was boosted as the Salerno Medical School, considered the most ancient medical institution of European West, reached its maximum splendour.

Salerno played a conspicuous part in the fall of the Norman kingdom. After the Emperor Henry VI's invasion on behalf of his wife, Constance, the heiress to the kingdom, in 1191, Salerno surrendered and promised loyalty on the mere news of an incoming army. This so disgusted the archbishop, Nicholas of Ajello, that he abandoned the city and fled to Naples, which held out in a siege. In 1194, the situation reversed itself: Naples capitulated, along with most other cities of the Mezzogiorno, and only Salerno resisted. It was sacked and pillaged, much reducing it importance and prosperity. Henry had his reasons, though. He had entrusted Constance to the citizens and they had betrayed him and handed her over to King Tancred. Henry's son, Frederick II, moreover, issued a series of edicts that reduced Salerno's role in favour of Naples (in particular, the foundation of the University of Naples in that city). Her combined treachery and stubbornness cost Salerno much after the Hohenstaufen conquest.

Following the advice of Giovanni da Procida (a famous citizen of that time), King Manfred of Sicily, Frederick II's son, ordered a dock that still now has his name, to be built.

Moreover Manfred founded Saint Matthew's Fair, which was the most important in the South of Italy. After the Angevin conquest the city was particularly a work of a famous sculptor, Boboccio da Piperno admired by Queen Consort Margherita of Durazzo who took up her abode in Salerno and was buried in the monumental tomb, which is today in the cathedral.

Salerno and the revival of medical learning in Western Europe

A noted medical school, or series of schools, existed at Salerno from the at least the 10th century, and by the 11th Century it was widely acknowledged by contemporaries as the centre of medical knowledge in western Europe, in much the same way as Alexandria had been in the ancient world.

Around 1060 a Benedictine monk native of Carthage, Constantine the African, arrived at the Abbey of Monte Cassino, 100 miles to the north of Salerno. With his knowledge of Arabic and Greek as well as Latin, he began to translate many of the medical texts from ancient Greece and Rome from the surviving Arabic translations into Latin. Constantine translated around 20 major works himself, such as Galen's ars parva, Hippocratic work including the aphorisms and the prognostics and the great encyclopedic work known as the patengi. However, his most significant translation was probably the Isogoge of Joanittius, which would serve as an introduction to medical theory and practise for centuries.

The Sanseverino

From the 14th century onwards, most of the Salerno province became the territory of the Princes of Sanseverino, powerful feudal lords, who acted as real owners of the Region. They accumulated an enormous political and administrative power and attracted artists and men of letters inside their own princely palace. In the 15th century the city was the scene of battles between the Angevin and the Aragonese royal houses with whom the local lords took sides alternatingly.

Salerno in a print from the 17th century.

In the first decades of the 16th century the last descendant of the Sanseverino princes was in conflict with the Spanish Government, causing the ruin of the whole family and the beginning of a long period of decadence for the city. The years 1656, 1688 and 1694 represent sorrowful dates for Salerno: the plague and the earthquake which caused many victims.

A slow renewal of the city occurred in the 18th century with the end of the Spanish empire and the construction of many refined houses and churches characterising the main streets of the historical centre.

In 1799 Salerno was incorporated into the Parthenopean Republic. During the Napoleonic period, firstly Joseph Bonaparte and then Joachim Murat ascended the Neapolitan throne. The latter decreed the closing of the Salerno Medical School, that had been declining for decades to the level of a theoretical school.In the same period even the religious Orders were suppressed and numerous ecclesiastical properties were confiscated.

The city expanded beyond the ancient walls and sea connections were potentiated as they represented an important road network that crossed the town connecting the eastern plain with the area leading to Vietri and Naples.

After the unification of Italy a slow urban development continued, many suburban areas were enlarged and large public and private buildings were created. The city went on developing till the Second World War.

World War II and after

In September 1943, Salerno was the scene of the landing of the allies and from February 12 to July 17 1944 it gave hospitality to the Government of Marshal Pietro Badoglio.

The post-war period was difficult for all the Italian cities, but Salerno managed to improve little by little and to aim at becoming a modern European city. In recent years the town administration has taken great strides giving a great impulse to the revaluation of the whole urban territory.

Main sights

Salerno as seen from the Canalone quarter.

The renewal of the historical centre has been directed towards the rediscovery of the artistic and cultural treasures of an exceptional land.

Salerno appears as a welcoming community for tourists from all over the world with its historical centre, where it is possible to admire both the traces of its ancient history and the fervour of artisan shops and places for cultural and musical aggregation attended by thousands of people.

Churches

*The magnificent Cathedral
*San Pietro in Vinculis
*St. Augustine
*St. Apollonia
*St. Benedict was originally part of monastery from 7th-9th centuries, connected to a massive aqueduct whose remains are still visible today. After the Saracen destruction in 884, it was rebuilt by Abbot Angelarius with a nave and two aisles. Remains of an entrance quadriporticus can still be seen.
*Church of the Annunziata (14th century)
*St. George is the most noteworthy Baroque church in Salerno, thanks to its high-quality frescoes by Francesco and Angelo Solimena (late 17th century). It is related to one of the most ancient monasteries of the city, dating back to the early 9th century, of which remains of apse frescoes has been recently brought to light.
*St. Gregory is small church it the city's historical centre, whose origins are still unclear. A document states its existence in 1058.
*St. Michael

Other sights

*The Arechi Castle is a massive castle commanding the city from a 300 m high hill. It was enlarged by Arechi II over a pre-existing Roman-Byzantine construction. It houses rooms for exhibitions and congresses.
* The Terracena Castela was built by Robert Guiscard in 1076-1086 as a Royal mansion, next to the Eastern walls. Only scarces remains (mainly tower-houses in tufa) can be seen today, as it was destroyed by an earthquake in 1275.
*Palazzo D'Avossa (17th century), with frescoes inspired to the Gerusalemme liberata.
*Province Archaeological Museum
*Museo Didattico della Scuola Medica Salernitana
*Diocesan Museum
*Provincial Gallery
*Archaeological Area of Fratte

The Schola Medica Salernitana in a miniature from Avicenna's Canon.

The port of Salerno.

Culture

Salerno hosted the oldest university in Europe, the Schola Medica Salernitana, the most important source of medical knowledge in Europe in the early Middle Ages.

The University Institute of Magistero "Giovanni Cuomo", founded in 1944, received, therefore, the distinguished heritage of an ancient tradition. Since 1968, when the University of Salerno became public, enrollment has increased substantially. Today the two campuses of Fisciano and Baronissi take in over 40,000 students attending the wide range of subjects offered by the 9 Faculties: Economics, Pharmaceutics, Law, Engineering, Humanities, Foreign Languages, Political Science, Natural Science, Mathematics and Physics, and Education Science.

Economy

The economy of Salerno is mainly based on services and tourism, as most of the city's manufacturing base did not survive the economic crisis of the 1970s. The remaining ones are connected to pottery and food production and treatment.

The port of Salerno is one of the most active of the Tyrrhenian Sea. It moves some 7 millions of tons of goods a year, 60% of which made up by containers.

Salerno: Encyclopedia BETA

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