Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
THE NORMANS & THE ANGEVINS
By the beginning of the 11th century, Naples was a prospering duchy. Industry and culture
were thriving and Christianity had conquered the masses. Outside the city, however, the
situation was more volatile as the Normans began to eye up the Lombard principalities of
Salerno, Benevento, Capua and Amalfi.
AMALFI: THE GOLDEN DAYS
Musing on the fabled town of Amalfi, 19th-century scribe Renato Fucini declared that when the town's
inhabitants reach heaven on Judgement Day, it will be just like any other day for them. It must have
been a view shared by the Roman patricians shipwrecked on its coast in AD 337. Seduced by the area's
beauty, they decided to ditch their long-haul trip to Constantinople and stay put. Despite the fans,
Amalfi's golden era would arrive in the 9th century, when centuries of Byzantine rule were ditched for
Marine Republic status. Between this time and the ruinous Pisan raids of 1135 and 1137, its ever-ex-
panding fleet brought a little bit of Amalfi to the far reaches of the Mediterranean, from churches named
in honour of Sant'Andrea (Amalfi's patron saint) to a 'Little Amalfi' quarter in 10th-century Con-
stantinople, complete with expat shops and schools.
The Normans had arrived in southern Italy in the 10th century, initially as pilgrims en
route from Jerusalem, later as mercenaries attracted by the money to be made fighting for
the rival principalities and against the Arab Muslims in Sicily. And it was to just one such
mercenary, Rainulfo Drengot, that the duke of Naples, Sergio IV, gave the contract to drive
the Lombards out of Capua. Capua duly fell in 1062, followed by Amalfi in 1073 and
Salerno four years later. By 1130 most of southern Italy, including Sicily, was in Norman
hands and it was only a question of time before Naples gave in to the inevitable. It did so in
1139. The Kingdom of the Two Sicilies was thus complete.
The Normans maintained their capital in Sicily, and Palermo began to outshine Naples.
And yet the Neapolitans seemed happy with their lot, but when the last of the Norman
kings, Tancred, was succeeded by his enemy Henry Hohenstaufen of Swabia in 1194, the
mood turned ugly. The Neapolitans despised their new Swabian rulers and were delighted
when Charles I of Anjou defeated them at the battle of Benevento in February 1265.
