Il Cilento

Leaning against the ancient village of Agropoli, the Castle stands in all its austere beauty on the promontory of the city, embellishing with its architecture the already enchanting Cilento area. Its origins are very old, the first testimonies come from the Greek-Byzantine period , when a rampart was built as a watchtower. Over the centuries, the presence of the Normans first and then the Angevins, has outlined the physics of the castle by expanding the plant with towers and reinforcing the defenses with thick and high walls. Unfortunately, not only a part of the curtain and the moat remains of this historical period. In fact, it is the next phase, the Aragonese of the fifteenth century, to give it its definitive appearance. The castle became a real defensive fortress, with loopholes and surrounding moat, so as to hinder the arrival of the enemy in all directions. Over the centuries, its destination changes again, becoming the private residence of noble families. With a triangular plan and three circular towers, it stands on the promontory, fitting itself like a vertex inside the area of ​​the ancient village, while the base stretches out of the inhabited nucleus, as an advanced fortification on the hill slope from the sweetest and most exposed slope to assaults.

Around the walls of the castle there is a wide and deep moat, now distinguishable on the side towards the village, while the difference in height on the eastern side has almost disappeared due to the agricultural works and the land subsidence that had occurred over the centuries. The castle has the appearance assumed after the restructuring of the Aragonese period (XV century AD) that must have considerably enlarged the original plant, triangular shaped. The interior of the castle is occupied by the parade ground and buildings leaning on the north and east sides. The square, now used as a garden and outdoor theater, is not the result of an artificial filling, but rests on the rock incorporated in the castle walls at the time, while on the northern side is the “Hall of the French”, so called I remember the stop of the troop of the French troops in the Napoleonic period. The castle of Agropoli is linked to two characters: Luisa Sanfelice, whose family remains the coat of arms on a door, heroine of the Neapolitan Republic of 1799, executed the following year, minor character of the Neapolitan revolution of 1799, whose human story inspired the novel by Alexandre Dumas (father), La San Felice, and the French writer Marguerite Yourcenar, who mentioned it in the story “Anna, soror”.

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