Royal Palace of Caserta

Stand still for a moment and listen. Gravel crunches under shoes. Water moves somewhere far ahead of you, too far to see. In front of you rises a wall of pale stone and brick, row after row of windows, so long that your eyes cannot take it in at once. This is the Royal Palace of Caserta. It was built to make a visitor feel exactly what you may be feeling now — small, and a little amazed.

The idea came from Charles of Bourbon, King of Naples in the middle of the eighteenth century. He wanted a new seat of government, away from the crowded capital and its exposed coastline. He chose this plain at the foot of the hills, north of Naples. For his architect, he chose Luigi Vanvitelli, a Neapolitan-born designer working in Rome. The first stone was laid in 1752. The ceremony took place on the king's birthday.

Here is the first surprise. Charles never lived here. In 1759 he inherited the throne of Spain and left for Madrid. His young son Ferdinand took the crown of Naples, and work continued under him. Vanvitelli died in 1773, long before the palace was finished. His son Carlo carried on the project. Decorating the interiors took many more decades, well into the nineteenth century.

As you look at the main front, notice how calm it is. There are no towers at the corners and no wild ornament. Vanvitelli used long horizontal lines, regular windows, and a gentle rhythm of columns at the centre. The style is late Baroque turning toward Neoclassical. Neoclassical means an architecture inspired by ancient Greece and Rome — order, symmetry, restraint. The power here comes from size and discipline, not decoration.

The building is a vast rectangle. Inside, two long wings cross each other and divide the space into four large courtyards. Walk through the central passage and you can see this plan for yourself. From the middle, long views open in several directions at once. Vanvitelli designed this crossing point like a stage set. Carriages could enter, pause, and see the courtyards, the staircase, and the park beyond, all from one spot.

Now turn toward the grand staircase. This is where many visitors stop talking. A single wide flight rises between two marble lions, then splits into two. The walls are lined with coloured marble from different parts of the kingdom. At the top, an oval vestibule lets you look up into two domes, one above the other. The effect is clever. Musicians could play from the space between them, and the sound seemed to come from nowhere.

From the vestibule you reach the Palatine Chapel, the royal chapel. Its double row of columns and its long, bright hall recall the chapel at Versailles, near Paris. Caserta was often compared to Versailles, and the Bourbons of Naples were related to the French royal house. The chapel was badly damaged by bombing during the Second World War. What you see today is partly a careful restoration.

The royal apartments follow one after another. Some rooms belong to the eighteenth century, with painted ceilings and gilded stucco. Others were decorated later, in the cooler style of the Napoleonic years and after. Look at the floors, the silk on the walls, and the clocks and furniture. Each room was a statement about taste and power. Keep an eye out, too, for the royal nativity scene, a Neapolitan tradition of hundreds of small, detailed figures.

Here is the second surprise. In the spring of 1945, this palace served as Allied headquarters in Italy. In late April of that year, German representatives signed the surrender of their forces in Italy here, at Caserta. A building designed to celebrate one king's ambition became the place where a modern war ended in this country. It is worth remembering as you walk these quiet corridors.

Now step outside, into the park. The main avenue runs straight away from the palace for about three kilometres, rising slowly toward the hills. Along it, a chain of fountains and long pools steps upward. Each fountain shows a scene from classical mythology. You can walk the whole way, but many visitors take the shuttle bus or rent a bicycle. Either way, the distance is part of the experience.

At the far end, water falls down a long rocky slope called the Great Cascade. Below it stands the fountain of Diana and Actaeon. The story comes from ancient Roman poetry. The hunter Actaeon sees the goddess Diana bathing. As punishment, she turns him into a stag, and his own hounds attack him. The sculptors show both moments — Diana with her nymphs on one side, and Actaeon already changing on the other.

All this water had to come from somewhere. Vanvitelli also built an aqueduct to carry it from springs in the mountains, across valleys, to the park. Beside the cascade, a gate leads into the English Garden. Queen Maria Carolina, Ferdinand's wife, wanted this garden. Unlike the straight lines of the main park, it has winding paths, exotic trees, and artificial ruins. In 1997, the palace, the park, the aqueduct, and the nearby silk village of San Leucio were listed together as a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

You may also feel that you have seen these halls before. Film-makers have used the palace many times. Its staircase and rooms appeared as the queen's palace on the planet Naboo in the Star Wars films of the late 1990s and early 2000s. Hollywood thrillers have filmed here too. It makes sense. Few real buildings can stand in for an imaginary empire so easily.

Before you leave, stand once more on the long avenue and look back. The palace sits low and wide across the plain, the hills behind you, the town of Caserta around it. Notice the light on the stone, the sound of water, the people moving slowly in the distance. A king planned all of this and never saw it. Today it belongs to everyone who walks here — including you.