Maniace
Syracuse was a fortified Greek city, but little of this
remains, other than Eurialus Castle on the hill at Belvedete to the
west. The first known castle was built by the Byzantine
commander, George Maniakes (d.1042) who captured Syracuse from the
Arabs for Emperor Michael IV of Byzantium (d.1041) in 1038. One of the
bronze rams he placed by the castle gate still exists in the city
museum and 2 replicas exist in the castle museum.
Maniakes had the moat dug to cut the promontory off from the
city. Presumably it was behind this that the Emperor
Frederick II (d.1250) built the current castle between 1232 and 1240 on
the site of its predecessor which had been destroyed in the earthquake of February 1169. This was later called Maniace in
honour of Maniakes. A letter of Frederick sent on 17 November
1239 from Lodi in Lombardy concerned the castle's construction.
In it the emperor welcomed the diligence with which Richard Lentini,
the guardian of the building works, gave for our castle of Syracusie and
reassured him that his request for the munitioning of Syracuse and
Lentini castles for the protection of Syracuse and our Saracens and
workforce would be done with the supply of corn, barley, wine, cheese
as well as other foodstuffs and clothes. This was presumably
done and by 1240 Syracuse castle was recorded as a functioning imperial
castle.
On 13 August l263, King Manfred (d.1266) wrote to two Swabian lords of
Syracuse, Riccardo Vetrani and Giovanni Piedilepre. After
Manfred's death the castle passed to the Angevins and in May 1272 the fortress was
recorded as the palace of Syracuse (palazzo Siracusa) when King Charles' chancellor set its garrison as either one knight or a squire. At the same time Ortigia, the main island of Syracuse, was garrisoned with 12 knights.
In 1273 the palace was recorded as Siragusie castle. The expulsion of King Charles (d.1285) during the Sicilian Vespers of 1282 led to King Peter III of
Aragon (d.1285) and his wife, Constance of Sicily (d.1302), residing at
the castle in their newly acquired kingdom. In 1300 a truce
was signed here between Frederick III
of Sicily (d.1337) and King
Robert Anjou of Naples (d.1343). In 1302 Maniace castle became
the
seat of the Royal Chamber, a feudal domain given by Frederick III to
his wife Eleanor Naples (d.1341) as a royal dowry. In 1302
Maniace castle became the seat of the Royal Chamber, a feudal domain
given by Frederick III to his wife Eleanor Naples (d.1341) as a royal
dowry together with Francavilla, Lentini, Mineo and Vizzini. It
is presumed that the castle fell to the Angevins in 1325/6 in their
seizure of much of the south coast of Sicily.
In
1448, after a splendid banquet held in the halls of the castle,
Captain Giovanni Ventimiglia, had all the Sicilian guests accused of
treason and killed. For this he obtained from King Alfonso II
(d.1495) the gift of the two Byzantine bronze rams, the niches for
which still exist on either side of the main castle gate. The
fortress then
remained a hereditary holding of the queens of Sicily until
1537. At the end of century the city was refortified and
Castello Maniace became a nodal point in the walls designed by the
Spanish military engineer Ferramolino. To this end the towers
were cut down and the whole reinforced to take artillery, a new gun
battery being built on the point. A century later on 5
November 1704, the castle was ruined by an explosion in the powder
magazine. Yet another century on the castle, after having
passed through Lord Nelson's hands, was again refortified for more
modern cannons. After the wars in 1838 a blockhouse was built
which remained in use until the Second World War.
It seems possible that the Swabian castles of Augusta and Maniace were
designed as signs of Imperial power to those entering the European
territories of the emperor. Certainly the great hall of Maniace is the
greatest hall of its time in Europe.
Description
The castle as built by Frederick II between 1232 and 1240 formed a
square 167' long with 4 boldly projecting round towers at the corners,
all the enceinte being a massive 12' thick. This was all set
on a 3 stepped plinth, which was octagonal underneath the
towers. The whole is built in a fine ashlar.
The 4 castle towers faced the four points of the compass, with the main
entrance being to the northwest. This was an ogival hole in the
wall
style affair and had a beautiful ogival arch surmounted by the Habsburg
coat of arms - a double-headed eagle - put there in 1618. The
decorative nature of the gateway is striking compared with the bare
ashlar walls around it. On either side above the capitals are
the remains of animal carvings. Flanking the gate are the
niches for the bronze rams. The portal has 3 columns on
either side, the wooden portcullis lying behind the first.
Before it was a drawbridge, filled in probably in the seventeenth
century when an insignificant barbican, long since destroyed, was
added. Flanking the gate were two impressive Romanesque
windows. At each end of the walls were once tall towers which
have now been cut down to only 2 floors. The northeast front is
similar to the northwest, except for there is no gate and 5 first floor
Romanesque windows. The southwest front is similar apart from
there
is a small, blocked door, similar in some respects to the gate to the
northeast, but without a portcullis. In this wall, near the west
tower, is a staircase that goes down through the rock to a 3' square
water source, known as the bath of the queen. The southeast front has
just 3
windows and a ground floor entrance. The corner towers all
appear pretty similar, although old prints show that the south tower
was a floor or two higher and housed a lighthouse. Whether
this was part of the original design or a later addition is
unknown.
Within the defensive enceinte there was one great hall, with the roof
held up by 16 decorative columns and as many semi and quarter columns
along the walls as well as 24 square-shaped ribbed crosses (32'x32' by
34' high). Within the hall were 2 sets of fireplaces opposing
each other. Presumably these would have supplied some light
to the rather dark interior due to the few and small Romanesque
windows. After the hall's collapse other buildings were built
in the courtyard. Recently restoration work has rebuilt much
of the roof.
Surrounding the inner castle was an outer ward of various
dates. The earliest part seems to have been a mantlet which
surrounded the ward, skirting around the towers in a similar manner to
the middle ward at Harlech
in Wales. The Maniace mantlet
appears to have been destroyed apart from the southwest side. To
east and west the mantlet has been grafted onto the later walls of the
outer ward. The bulk of the outer ward now lies to the northwest
of
the castle and appears to be late medieval at the earliest.
To the southeast is the nineteenth century gun fort, while to the north
is the
great ditch that is crossed by a Romanesque looking bridge, right
down to the tiles used in its construction.
Why not join me here and at other Sicilian
castles? Information on this and other tours can be found at Scholarly
Sojourns.
Copyright©2019
Paul Martin Remfry