Where Ferrante of Aragon was crowned King
The Cathedral is the most important sacred building in the city, and has been the site of very important events over the centuries, such as the coronation of the king of Naples, Ferrante of Aragon (1459).
Its construction, which began in the 12th century in Romanesque style, above a pre-existing early Christian church, saw an expansion in the 13th and 14th centuries, when the imposing apse was built, fitted with an ambulatory and radial chapels, which can still be admired today and on the outside of which two granite columns are used.
In the sixteenth century, through the construction of two spans, the apse was connected to the older body of the church.
Numerous Renaissance works are kept inside: the Eucharistic tabernacle and, above all, the panel with the Madonna of the Challenge and, on the back, the blessing Christ, in front of which the Italian knights who took part in the Challenge raised their prayer of thanks for their victory.
The diocesan museum is located on the first floor of the sacristy.
Photogallery
What to see here
Madonna with Child and Savior
Traditionally identified as the "devoted figure of the Madonna" before whom, as sources say, the thirteen Italian knights who took part in the Challenge prayed, the icon is therefore also called the Madonna of the Challenge.
Read allThe Savior
Preserved inside the diocesan museum on the upper floor of the sacristy of the Cathedral of Santa Maria Maggiore, the panel represents the full-figure blessing Savior
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Tabernacle
The marble panel depicting the infant Christ in arms is located behind the altar and this is what remains of the Santissimo Sacramento chapel
Read allTrinity and Virgin on the Throne and Assumption
Exemplary among the many paintings with a gold background present in Barletta, the panel in the Cathedral is probably the only surviving part of a more complex polyptych
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Scheda scientifica sulla Cattedrale di Barletta