Charles of Bourbon
The birth of modern archaeology on the Bay of Naples and the creation of an international tourist attraction.
The goal of In the Shadow of Vesuvius has been to confront the long sweep of history and food culture that exists in Campania and the Bay of Naples. It is a daunting task, and so I have tried to chip away at it by letting my experiences guide me.
I began with a fascination with the ancient city of Pompeii. Over the years, and in particular over the last several weeks, I have become fascinated by the almost three-hundred year history of the excavations and presentation of the archaeological sites on the Bay of Naples and of Pompeii and Herculaneum in particular. This has led to an appreciation of the role played by Charles the VII of Naples (also known as Charles V of Sicily and later Charles III of Spain and thus colloquially as Charles of Bourbon). My next post will deal more explicitly with Charles and food culture, but since so much of what we know about the ancient world at the Bay of Naples begins with the excavations at Herculaneum and Pompeii I will begin here.
Charles was born in 1716 to King Philip V of Spain and his second wife Elisabetta Farnese. Elisabetta was the last heir of the famous Renaissance family that controlled Parma and produced the important Roman family that gave the world Paul III (Pope 1534-1549) who was the Pope who initiated the Counter-Reformation. It was under his pontificate that Michelangelo finished the Last Judgement in the Sistine Chapel and created the Pauline Chapel. He also created, as the seat of his family’s power, the Palazzo Farnese and filled the palace with what was perhaps the greatest single collection of antique sculpture—a collection that is still known by the family name.
Elisabetta was born in the Palazzo della Pilotta in the Duchy of Parma in 1692. As the sole heir to the throne of Parma, she was considered very desirable and she ultimately was married by proxy to Philip V of Spain. Elisabetta was extremely talented and shrewd and played not only a significant role in her husband’s court—she also secured the throne of Naples for her son, who was second in line for the throne of Spain as the son of Philip’s first wife—Ferdinand VI—had claim to it. It was through the Treaty of Vienna in 1731 that Charles was confirmed as Duke of Parma and in 1738 in the 1738 Treaty of Vienna that he ascended to the thrones of Naples and Sicily. Elisabetta was an extraordinary woman, and I will leave it to you to look her up. What seems clear is that her son inherited many of her talents and ambitions.
Sir Harold Acton in his book The Bourbons of Naples writes:
In 1734, after more than two centuries as a province of Spain and Austria, Naples became the capital of an Independent kingdom under Charles of Bourbon, who deserved his reputation as an enlightened monarch. A sovereign of their own had come to reside among the Neapolitans, who felt once more that they were a nation. Charles was no miracle worker: he could not suddenly transform the social system and the character of his people, or cause trade and agriculture to flourish overnight. But he transformed the capital of his new kingdom, so that the Naples we see to-day remains pre-eminently a city of the Bourbons, The San Carlo Theatre, the national library, the Farnese collections brought from Parma, the first treasures from Herculaneum and Pompeii, the palaces of Capodimonte, Portici and Caserta, the Albergo dei Poveri, the fine squares now called Piazza Dante and Piazza Plebiscito—wherever we turn we see some splendid relic of Charles and his successors.
No impartial historian can deny that the Two Sicilies were happier under Charles than they had been for many a long century. The benefits of independence were soon apparent, and much solid progress was made. Charles should not be blamed if this progress was not dizzily spectacular, any more than he should be blamed for the eruptions of Vesuvius or for the earthquakes of 1738 and 1750. The peasants remained in a backward condition, but as Croce exclaimed:
‘After a century and a half after the unification of Italy— were they so much better off?' Some order was restored to public finance, and a long period of peace favoured prosperity. Ecclesiastical jurisdiction and immunities were curtailed, and at last clerical property (then about one-third of the whole kingdom) was taxed, though not beyond two per cent of its value. But Charles was more interested in the fine arts and the excavation of antiquities than in the problems of economy and legislation. The university was modernized and given a worthy home; archaeology was encouraged with notable results; there were numberless improvements in public and private life; houses were more conveniently furnished, and the use of glass windows became common; great architects, like Vanvitelli and Fuga, were commissioned to design the buildings we still admire; and Naples also became, as de Brosses wrote, ‘the capital of the musical world’. Progress paved the way for more progress, until the shattering repercussions of the French Revolution (P 10).
Literally, everywhere you turn in Naples you are reminded of this legacy. It is the legacy of the excavations of Herculaneum and Pompeii, and the creation of that that has become the Naples National Museum of Archaeology, that is of particular interest to me.
The actual “discovery” of Herculaneum dates to 1711 when a well was being dug by a farmer and pieces of sculpture were discovered. The Duke d’Elboeuf, a member of the French Nobility, who had come to Naples to serve under Joseph I, Holy Roman Emperor at Naples as lieutenant general of the Cavalry would buy the well and the land around it. Living in Naples, he had commissioned the Neapolitan Architect Fernando Sanfelice to construct a villa south of the city in Portici in 1711. D’Elboeuf recognized the beauty of the finds; and after he purchased the well from the farmer he continued the excavations. The well happened to hit the Theater of Herculaneum, which had a wealth of sculptural decoration. He used these not only to decorate his own Villa but also gave sculptures to other European royalty. Notably, these included the “Herculaneum Women” to Prince Eugene of Savoy in Vienna. Augustus III, elector of Saxony and King of Poland, purchased the statues in 1736 after Eugene’s death, and brought them to Dresden where they remain.
In 1738, four years after his arrival in Naples, Charles married Princess Amalia of Saxony, who was daughter of Augustus III and had admired the “Herculaneum Women.” That year they visited the Villa d’Elboeuf in Portici and so admired it and the collection of antiquities that they decided to take over the excavations and build a royal palace at Portici. Acton elaborates:
When Charles selected Portici as a residence, he was warned that it was dangerously near Vesuvius. ‘God Almighty, the Immaculate Virgin and San Gennaro will tend to that', he is said to have replied. On one side it was open to the sea, on the other to a large garden and wilderness of evergreen oaks planted on volcanic soil: a situation convenient both for hunting and fishing, but it was also near Herculaneum, a quarry of more subtle fascination. While digging a well, some labourers had unearthed a statue there in 1711. This came to the notice of Prince d'Elbeuf, who started secret excavations with fortunate results, filled his neighbouring villa with the statues, pillars and fragments he continued to find, and sent some choice statues to Vienna, where they were much admired. But he left with the Austrian regime and the digging ceased. Charles acquired his house and ordered Alcubierre, an engineer he had brought from Spain, to proceed with the excavations. The difficulties were considerable, for the old city was buried from fifty to sixty feet under petrified mud, and the houses of Resina stood over it. In spite of Alcubierre's clumsy methods, it is remarkable that so much of value came to light, and survived not only damage from pick-axe and gunpowder but also the ruthless manipulation of Canart, the sculptor mistakenly commissioned to restore broken statues. Besides removing the fine patina of bronzes, this vandal did not hesitate to melt down those with which his deadly fingers could not grapple; amongst others thus destroyed was the splendid torso of a Grecian charioteer.
Charles watched his collection grow by leaps and bounds, and housed it in a wing of his palace at Portici, where he spent many a delightful hour with the Queen and his learned curator, Marchese Venuti. A small band of sculptors, painters, engravers and scholars were employed to copy, restore and describe these amazing discoveries. But special permission was required to visit the underground ruins, which were not open to the general public. The privileged had to creep through holes from house to house with torches to light up the gloom. Among these was Horace Walpole, whose enthusiasm still has a breathless accent: This underground city is perhaps one of the noblest curiosities that ever has been discovered. ... You may walk the compass of a mile; but by the misfortune of the modern town being overhead, they are obliged to proceed with great caution, lest they destroy both one and t'other. By this occasion the path is very narrow, just wide enough and high enough for one man to walk upright ... except some columns, they have found all the edifices standing upright in their proper situation. There is one inside of a temple quite perfect. … It is built of brick plastered over and painted with architecture: almost all the insides of the houses are in the same manner; and, what is very particular, the general ground of all the painting is red. Besides this temple, they make out very plainly an amphitheatre: the stairs of white marble and the seats are very perfect... They have found among other things some fine statues, some human bones, some rice, medals, and a few paintings extremely fine. ... There is nothing of the kind known in the world; I mean a Roman city entire of that age, and that has not been corrupted with modern repairs. ... 'Tis certainly an advantage to the learned world that this has been laid up so long. Most of the discoveries in Rome were made in a barbarous age, where they only ransacked the ruins in quest of treasure.' But the interest of Herculaneum was somewhat eclipsed by the later discovery of the more extensive and approachable Pompeii.
Until the new palace of Caserta was built, Portici was the favourite residence of the royal family. Its peculiarity is that the old high road passes through the middle of the palace, so that every one going to Calabria, or even to Torre del Greco and the coastal towns, had to enter at one gate and go out at the other. 'So ill suited with rural still-ness,' remarked one traveller, 'that I should never fix on this bustling solitude for my recreation.' But the King and Queen were inured to living in public: privacy was as unfamiliar to them as to their humblest subjects, who like to look and be looked at, and no doubt they slept soundly while the coaches rattled through their courtyard (P 48-50).
The Golden Mile is the name given to the portion of road—The Strada Regina della Calabria—in the second half of the eighteenth century that is equivalent to a mile (according to the system of units used in the first half of the eighteenth century) between Portici / Resina (Herculaneum) and Torre del Greco. The prestige of the presence of the royal residence combined with the beauty of the place caused the nobility of Naples to have holiday villas built along this road. The architects Luigi Vanvitelli, Fernando Fuga, Domenico Antonio Vaccaro, and Ferdinando San Felipe all designed villas along the road with rococo and neo-classical gardens.
Charles grasped the importance of the finds at Herculaneum and while the early years of the excavations were criticized for their haphazard approach (Winkelman most notably) he sought to harness the interest in the ancient world by guarding access to it. Charles made Naples a must see stop on the eighteenth century grand tour. The finds from Herculaneum (and then the easier to excavate Pompeii) were brought to the Royal Palace in Portici in which one wing was dedicated to them—this museum became one of the first museums of antiquities in the world—and certainly the first Antiquarium dedicated to its adjacent site. In addition to the creation of the museum, Charles began the systematic publication of the finds that resulted in the eight volume book of engravings that was published between 1757 and 1792. These volumes were not for sale, at least initially, but were given as royal presents. Charles had a keen sense of how to generate interest and these works had a huge impact on design at the time.
With the death of his half brother, Ferdinand VI, in 1759 Charles succeeded to the Spanish Crown as Charles III. As the European order would not allow him to hold the crowns of Naples and Sicily along with the Spanish crown, he abdicated in favor of his son Ferdinand (1751-1825) who became Ferdinand IV of Naples and Ferdinand III of Sicily. Ferdinand had a long and complex reign that saw him deposed twice, first in 1799 he was briefly overthrown with the creation of the Parthenopean Republic—an idealistic effort supported by the French First Republic. It lasted from January to June, when it collapsed when Ferdinand returned.
The return was short lived as he was once again overthrown—this time by Napoleon in 1806 who put his brother Joseph on the throne. As he had in 1799, Ferdinand moved to Palermo. In 1808 Napoleon decided that Joseph had to go to Madrid and so he put his brother-in-law Gioacchino Murat on the throne in Naples. He remained in power until 1815, the year of European Restoration when Ferdinand returned. Ferdinand ruled for another ten years. In 1816, he founded the Real Museo Borbonico in Naples by moving the collection from Portici. In 1787 Ferdinand IV had brought the Roman Farnese Collection to Naples and this was combined with the finds from Herculaneum, Pompeii, and environs to create one of the most magnificent collections in the world.
The first 40 years of Ferdinand’s reign are intertwined with those of the British Diplomat William Hamilton (1730-1803). Hamilton was a British diplomat, politician, antiquarian and volcanologist who served as Envoy Extraordinary to the Kingdom of Naples from 1764 to 1800. Hamilton’s life is the subject of Susan Sontag’s beautiful book The Volcano Lover. Hamilton was a great collector of antiquities—particularly Greek vases found in Campania. In 1766-67 he published a volume of engravings of his collection entitled Collection of Etruscan, Greek, and Roman antiquities from the Cabinet of the Hon. W. Hamilton, His Britannick Maiesty’s Envoy Extraordinary at the Court of Naples. Three additional volumes were published in 1769-76. These books, like Le Antichità di Ercolano Esposte had a significant impact on design in the years following. Josiah Wedgwood among others drew inspirations from the designs and helped establish Neo-Classicism. In 1776, Hamilton published his other magnum opus: Campi Phlegraei. This work was a collection of his letters to the Royal Society on the volcanoes of the Bay of Naples (the Society had awarded him the Copley Medal in 1770). The text is accompanied by a series of engraved plates by Pietro Fabris commissioned by Hamilton to show the volcanoes and their eruptions in the area (most notably Vesuvius), rock strata, and specimens—all of which were hand colored.
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Hamilton’s second wife, Emma, would go on to be Horatio Nelson’s lover. As such, she became one of the most famous and reviled women in the world due to the coverage of their affair in the British Press of the time. Sontag tells this story and the tragic role that Hamilton and Nelson played in the death of many of Naples’ greatest intellectuals at the time of the quashing of the Parthenopean Republic.
In 1775, the year prior to the publication of Campi Phlegraei, Giovanni Carafa Duca di Noja published his Mappa Topografica Della Città di Napoli E De’ Suoi Contorni. This map in 35 plates is a portrait of the City of Naples and its environs at the time of its publications. The city portion of the map is much like the Noli Map of Rome (1748) but what makes it particularly compelling to me is that it extends into the countryside around Naples. I am particularly interested in how it shows the route from the Royal Palace in Naples south to the Royal Palace at Portici and beyond—the Golden Mile. Interestingly, it does not show the excavations at Pompeii. Hamilton does show the excavations in a plate that shows the digs at the Temple of Isis in Pompeii.
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With all this as background, I took a day to go to the Royal Palace at Portici and to explore the Royal Mile. One can “feel” the street that snakes along.
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The palace that was closed for many years can now be visited. They have created a museum to the museum that originally was located here. The odd thing is that the museum is not located in the original rooms of the museum which were on the north side of the Palace. The palace has an extraordinary view of the Bay of Naples with Capri occupying pride of place in the center, and equally impressive is the eastern side of the palace with its view of Vesuvius. It is these two sets of views and that the land slopes up towards Vesuvius so that the villas on the east side can look out over those on the west to the sea which made this street of Villas so beautiful. Most of these villas have now been absorbed into the urban fabric. Some have been restored by the Fondazione Ente Ville Vesuviane.
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I visited the Villa Campolieto designed by Mario Gioffredo and Luigi Vanvitelli who had also worked on the Royal Palace. It was built between 1755-1775.
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Walking down the Golden Mile from the Royal Palace we passed the entry to the underground passages to the Herculaneum Theater that had started all of the fascination with this place.
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While about a third of Herculaneum has been excavated to open air, much has not because the city of Resina (Since 1966 renamed Ercolano) has been built over it. I learned from my guide that the authorities are allowing visits three times a week from late September to early November which prompted me to get tickets for our next trip when we had planed on visiting Herculaneum with friends.
The trip home was also a piece of Bourbon history as I returned to the train station after seeing the harbor that they had built. The original Villa d’Elbouf overlooks the harbor and is presently being restored.
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The train tracks go right behind the villa. At the station is a plaque commemorating this line as the first train in Italy. Charles built the line in 1839 to connect the Royal Palace at Portici to the City of Naples.
I returned with Marian and our friends to visit Herculaneum and Pompeii this past weekend. After our tour of the exposed portion of the city, we made our way with a guide from the Soprintendenza to the door in the side of the building that says ”Teatro” on the Golden Mile.
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Descending down into the theater through tunnels we were not only reliving the world of Ancient Rome, but also the history of archaeology here on the Bay of Naples. At the back of the stage one goes through a small tunnel and sees the well which first exposed the ruins. It is amazing thinking about the original explorers climbing down this well and like miners digging the tunnels. In the ceiling of the small tunnel that you use to get there, there is the impression of the face of the statue of Marcus Nonius Balbus that was created by the pyroclastic material that covered the site.
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On Sunday afternoon when we returned to Naples, I went to the National Archaeology Museum to see the new (2023) installation of Paintings and Sculptures from Roman Campania. Here are found the sculptures from Herculaneum which emerged from the well, including the ones of Balbus as well as from the other sites around the Bay. The Bronze chariot that stood on top of the Theater of Herculaneum occupies a special gallery.
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These are among the pieces first illustrated in the “Antichita Ercolano” and that were exhibited at the Royal Palace of Portici—a palace that Charles built the first train in Italy to get to. This art remains in Naples because Charles took over the excavations from d’Ebouef and jealously guarded the artifacts. By doing so he made this view into the ancient world famous. It is a significant legacy.