Page 585 - The Rough Guide of Sicily

Noto is an almost perfect example of Scamozzi’s ideal. After the 1693 earthquake,
the old town was so devastated that it was decided to move its site and rebuild from
scratch, and the plan that was eventually accepted was almost an exact replica of
Scamozzi’s. Noto is constructed on a grid plan, traversed from east to west by a wide
corso crossing a main piazza, which is itself balanced by four smaller piazzas. The
buildings along the corso show remarkable balance and grace, while the attention of

the Baroque planners to every harmonious detail is illustrated by the use of a warm,
golden stone for the churches and palazzi.

Neighbouring towns in the southeast were also destroyed by the earthquake and
rebuilt along similar lines. Both Avola and Grammichele were moved from their hill-
top positions to the coastal plain, and their polygonal plans were similarly influenced
by Scamozzi. Grammichele, particularly, retains an extraordinary hexagonal layout,

unique in Sicily. Ragusa is more complex, surviving today as two towns: the
medieval Ragusa Ibla, which the inhabitants rebuilt after the earthquake, and the
Baroque upper town of Ragusa, which is built on a sloping grid plan, rather similar to
Noto. Although Ibla isn’t built to any kind of Baroque pattern, it does lay claim to one
of the most spectacular of Sicilian Baroque churches.

Catania was not completely destroyed by the earthquake, but was instead rebuilt

over its old site. Broad streets were built to link existing monuments and to facilitate
rescue operations in case of another earthquake. The city is divided into four quarters
by wide streets that meet in Piazza del Duomo, and wherever possible these spaces
are used to maximize the visual impact of a facade or monument. The main Piazza del
Duomo was conceived as a uniform set piece, while the main street, Via Etnea, cuts a
swath due north from here, always drawing the eyes to Mount Etna, smoking in the
distance.

On the other side of the island, Baroque Palermo evolved without the impetus of
natural disaster. There’s no comparable city plan, Palermo’s intricate central layout
owing more to the Arabs than to seventeenth- and eighteenth-century designers; what
Baroque character the city possesses has almost entirely to do with its highly
individual churches and palaces. These were constructed in a climate of apparent
opulence but encroaching bankruptcy; as the Sicilian aristocrats were attracted to

Palermo to pay court to the Spanish viceroy, they left the management of their lands to
pragmatic agents, whose short-sighted policies allowed the estates to fall into neglect.
This ate away at the wealth of the gentry, who responded by mortgaging their lands in
order to maintain their living standards. The grandiose palaces and churches they built
in the city still stand, but following the damage caused during World War II many are
in a state of terrible neglect and near collapse; wild flowers grow out of the facades,

and chunks of masonry frequently fall into the street below.