Seminario Arcivescovile di Salerno

Home to the Diocesan Museum of Salerno, the former Archbishop's Seminary (first turned into a home of the School of Medicine) was built near the Cathedral and was founded by Archbishop Gaspare Cervantes to order, with a provision of the Council of Trent (1543 -1563) to which he had taken part, each diocese to establish a college in which to train young people that decided to start the priestly life. The building was then expanded by his successor, Antonio Colonna I, in 1570, and then rebuilt again. In 1731, under the Archbishop of Capua, the structure was completely rebuilt and connected to the Cathedral with a ladder and a strictly neoclassical shape in 1832, when the Archbishop Lupoli had banked on the second floor and turned the entire main facade. With Archbishop Marino Paglia (1835-1857), who started renovations (building the marble altar in the chapel, reconstruction of the staircase, construction of large windows overlooking iron halls of dormitories, paintings with figures of saints and sages in the lobby), the fame achieved by the Seminary of Salerno, as a place of scientific and literary erudition was such that he considered one of the best institutions of the Kingdom. For this reason, he was visited by Giacomo Leopardi in 1836, by Pope Pius IX, and King Ferdinand II of Naples in 1849. The earthquake of November 23, 1980 caused considerable damage to the building and, after more than four centuries, was necessary to transfer the seminarians in a newly built complex.