Prince of Aragon Palace Aragon
Many have advanced the hypothesis that the imposing palace was built in the early 1700s. However, it is hard to imagine that more than a century elapsed between the founding of the village and the construction of the Palace, especially since the Naselli family had expressed a desire for a strong foothold in Aragon.
Confirmation that the construction of the palace occurred at the same time as the founding of the town comes to us from the testamentary deed from the first prince of Aragona, Luigi Naselli Saccano, drawn up on March nine, 1650 by notary Giuseppe Calderone.
This beautiful and majestic palace, the very symbol of Aragon, with its severe, massive and blocky appearance, blunted on its outer sides by four loggias (two of which, over time, have been walled up, one has been glassed in, and only one is intact and preserves and bears witness to part of the frescoes by the famous Flemish painter “Borremans”), is related to earlier sixteenth-century models of palatial building. Historical events, transformations, personal events, and the different economic conditions of those who owned it have left evidence that today constitutes an articulated system where high architectural quality alternates with times when transformations make it difficult to read the original state.
Around 1703, the year Prince Baldassare Naselli IV took his priestly vows, the palace acquired the appearance of an aristocratic residence and a courtly convent. A private chapel communicating with the Prince’s bedroom and the central loggia was built on the main floor.
In the early eighteenth century the palace reached its maximum splendor thanks to Prince Baldassare Naselli Branciforte, who enriched it with new furnishings, a very rich picture gallery and the creation of several frescoes entrusted to the Flemish painter Borremans.
The Prince’s death in 1753 and the family’s early financial problems marked the beginning of the palace’s decline.
In 1875 some transformations were made to the palace thanks to Prince Luigi Burgio Naselli, who, after embarking on priestly life, had the present chapel built on the ground floor. The Prince also began to work in the social sphere, and among his beneficiaries were the nuns of the Order of the Daughters of Charity si San Vincenzo dè Paoli, to whom he granted first the annex, then a ground-floor room with a small piece of land attached and finally the entire palace. In 1887, by deed notarized by Antonio Schiavo of Aragon, he founded the Prince of Aragon Girls’ Orphanage Institute whose management was entrusted to the Daughters of Charity.
