Palazzo Marchesale di Carife

The Marchesale Palace of Carife is a place of historical interest located in Via Roma, in the historic centre of the town.

Commissioned by the Capobianco marquises and rebuilt after the 1732 earthquake, the building stands in the Fossi district. It was built using the so-called "Alsatian" technique, with horizontal and vertical beams made of strong oak wood, integrated with diagonal ones to give greater rigidity and stability to the entire structure. The building is now owned by several families.

With its imposing appearance, the Marchesale Palace is built on a retaining wall that is an integral part of the main floor, which differs from the main floor in that it has a rounded stone kerb. It is accessed through an archivolted portal in squared ashlar, on which the four-square coat of arms of the Capobianco family is placed. The perimeter walls of the courtyard, the balconies, the windows with carved stone bases and the doorways to the various rooms have been preserved from the original structure. The rooms on the upper and ground floors, which retain 17th-century architectural features, can be clearly seen. The large inner courtyard, which still retains part of the river pebble and terracotta paving in a star-shaped pattern, and the garden arranged on terraces are striking, while the rooms inside have lost their original characteristics. A fresco depicting the Immaculate Conception, several doors with gilded arboreal motifs, paintings and furnishings of the period are preserved in a State Room.

The seismic events that took place in the area profoundly altered the layout of the historic centre of Carife, of which the Marchesale Palace is one of the few testimonies that have survived intact to this day.