Going on towards east, we reach the square of San Domenico Maggiore, where is the apse of the Church that gives the name to the square, built between 1283 and 1324 by Charles of Anjou for the Dominican friars. Inside the adjacent monastery they hosted for some centuries the University of Naples, where also San Tommaso d'Aquino taught. When the Aragonese kings came, this became the main church of the city, intended to house the tombs of the new regnant dynasty, and it substituted for this function the Church of Santa Chiara. The Aragoneses restructured the square in Renaissance shapes: it became the new political centre of the city, where the kings received their subjects. The delegates of noblemen met in the near Seggio del Nilo (Nile Seat), that was a small nobiliary parliament: it was demolished in the 17th century and on its place they put a Roman marble statue which decorated it and represents the "Nile Lying", initially placed there by the colony of Alexandrine merchants who had settled in this area.

After the square of San Domenico we find the street of San Gregorio Armeno, which joins Spaccanapoli with Via Tribunali and that collects all the craftsmen of Neapolitan Christmas Crib (Manger Scenes). Each Christmas this street becomes destination of pilgrimage by tourists and enthusiasts, and turns itself into a kermesse of lights and colors, where they merge popular and cultured religion, Christianity and paganism. On a side of the street there is the Convent of San Gregorio Armeno, founded in the 8th century by some Armenian nuns escaped to the iconoclastic campaign and reconstructed in the 17th century. Interesting are the bell tower hanging over the street and the cloister with an unusual panoramic view over the gulf of Naples. The streets ends in the square of San Gaetano, which stands upon the heart of the ancient city (Greek and Roman, agora and forum), whose only remains are the two Roman columns on the facade of the Church of San Paolo Maggiore.  [ More...]