The Castle of Valentino is an historic building in Turin, is located in Valentino Park on the banks of the Po. Today it is owned by the Polytechnic of Turin and hosts degree courses (three-year and master’s) in Architecture.
In the nineteenth century the castle underwent significant interventions that distort the seventeenth-century pavilion-system structure. In 1858 the castellamontian porticoes connecting the pavilions, one storey high above ground, were demolished and the two-storey galleries were built to a design by Domenico Ferri and Luigi Tonta. Starting from 1850-51, the expansion of the city to the south was planned (today’s San Salvario district ) and very soon the Valentino castle, from an extra-urban building, was urbanized.
The Valentino Castle has been included in the List of the UNESCO World Heritage since 1997, as well in the sito seriale «Le Residenze sabaude» (The Savoy residences), as property of the Politecnico di Torino, founded by the union of the Scuola di applicazione with the Regio Museo Industriale (Royal Industrial Museum) in 1906, and main seat of the Architecture Departments.
Subject of recent restoration, the Castle is regaining its ancient splendor. The rooms on the first floor have been gradually reopened and house the offices of the management of the Architecture and Design department of the Politecnico di Torino. On 12 May 2007 the splendid room of the Zodiac reopened, with its central fresco which mythologically depicts the river Po with the features of Poseidon.
History
The ancient castle was purchased by Emanuele Filiberto di Savoia, the Duke Testa di Ferro, on the advice of the great architect Andrea Palladio. The origins of the name of the Valentino Castle, bought by Emmanuel Philibert in 1564, after his official arrival in Piemonte, following the Cateau-Cambrésis Treaty and the transfer of the Savoy capital to Turin, refer to the geomorphological nature of the land, already named “Vallantinum”, not flat and even, but marked by the presence of a natural valley with watercourse, called “bealera del Valentino”, which still flows underground.
In 1580, upon the death of the Duke, the castle passed to the heir Carlo Emanuele I, who three years later, in 1583, ceded it to Filippo I d’Este. In 1585 Carlo Emanuele I arrived in Turin by river, with his wife Caterina of Austria, arriving from Moncalieri; Filippo I d’Este welcomed him to the castle. In 1586 the castle returned to the property of Casa Savoia.
This structure hosted noble families such as the Este of San Martino, the Saintmerane, the Cicogna, the Pacelli and the Calvi, who bought six rooms in the castle. The origin of its name is uncertain. The first document in which the name Valentinium appears is from 1275; someone traces his name back to San Valentino because his relics have been preserved since 1700 in a crystal case in the church of San Vito (on the hill overlooking the Parco del Valentino), transferred following the destruction of a church near the current park. Some scholars say that, in a singular intertwining of religious memory and social life, it used to be celebrated in the Turin fluvial park, on February 14th (now the festival of lovers ), a gallant festival in which every lady called Valentino her knight.
The castle owes its present form to Madama Reale, the very young Maria Cristina of Bourbon, (wife of Vittorio Amedeo I of Savoy and daughter of Henry IV, first king of France of Bourbon branch). France looks at the style of this splendid palace: four corner towers surround the horseshoe-shaped building with a large floor courtyard. The current pavement with pebbles of white and black rivers dates back to the interventions carried out in 1961. The roofs with two mansard floors (only false floors) are typically transalpine and all the architectural style reflects the tastes of the young princess. The works lasted almost 30 years, from 1633 to1660 on plans by Carlo and Amedeo di Castellamonte: the Duchess Maria Cristina lived there since 1630 admiring the frescoes by Isidoro Bianchi of Campione d’Italia and the stuccos of her sons Pompeo and Francesco. It is precisely to her that the scenic entrance arch on the facade with the Savoy coat of arms is owed.
In conformity with the French pavillon-système, the architects Carlo and Amedeo di Castellamonte conceived the construction of an impressive building by doubling the existing architectural structure, enclosed by a pavilion roof and flanked by two tall, slender, lateral towers which are connected with terraced porticoes to two new pavilion roofs, towards Turin and linked by a semicircular exedra. The forepart extending toward the Po can be identified as the symmetrical focus of the whole building. The creation of a broad, double staircase on the city side going up to the loggia which leads directly into the Salone d’onore also gave greater importance to the central section.
At the noble floor, the Salone d’onore is the center of a symmetrical plan designed by two identical apartments, towards Turin and towards Moncalieri, in which famous painters and stucco workers coming from the Lake region (now between Lombardy and Canton Ticino)worked. The fresco in the large panel in the center of the ceiling shows the main theme, evoked in the border at the top of the wall. The stories were chosen by Filippo of San Martino d’Agliè, scholar of Cristina’s Court and by Emanuele Tesauro, author of several publications in rhetorics and the history of the Savoy royal family. In the northern apartment, built for the Duchess, worked Isidoro Bianchi (from Campione) and his partners; in the southern apartment, designed for Carlo Emanuele, a symbolic narration teaches the young crown prince the art of ruling.
At the beginning of the 19th century, no longer used as ducal residence, the building housed the Scuola di Veterinaria (Veterinary Medicine School) and then it was employed as military barracks until it was ceded by the Crown to the State ownership in 1850. In the middle of the century, on the left side of the Po a large city park was created, whose project was presented on the occasion of the Sesta Esposizione Nazionale dei prodotti di industria (Sixth National Exposition of Industrial Products) by the Finance Minister Camillo Benso Conte di Cavour at the Valentino Castle, restored on the basis of the Luigi Tonta and Domenico Ferri’s project. Conforming to the Eclettism culture spread in that period, through a historicist language, the terraces linking the two towers were replaced by two big galleries. The XIX century works adjusted some stuccoes and paintings of the rooms too and, above all, changed completely the main frontage towards Turin, by marking the change from the idea of palace to the XIX century idea of “castle”.
In 1859, the so-called Casati Law marked the rearrangement of the Italian educational programs at different level (primary, secondary, higher education) and in Turin it symbolized the official opening of the Regia Scuola di applicazione per gli ingegneri (Royal School of Application for Engineers), at the beginning of the Sixties at theValentino Castle. After many subsequent expansion and restoration works, the Castle began to be used as university seat, place where research and specific studies can be carried out. It also represented a center of scientific and technological experimentations which led to the best choices for the safeguard and preservation of cultural heritage.
Starting from the 1920s, the Valentino palace was used as a barracks by the Genio Pontieri, a function that remained unchanged until the early months of 1860.
In the nineteenth century the castle underwent significant interventions that distort the seventeenth-century pavilion-system structure. In 1858 the castellamontian porticoes connecting the pavilions, one storey high above ground, were demolished and the two-storey galleries were built to a design by Domenico Ferri and Luigi Tonta. Starting from 1850-51, the expansion of the city to the south was planned (today’s San Salvario district ) and very soon the Valentino castle, from an extra-urban building, was urbanized. In 1855 the Turin municipality launched the international competition for the design of the Valentino public park, a competition won by Jean-Baptiste Kettmann.
Subject of recent restoration, the Castle is regaining its ancient splendor. The rooms on the first floor have been gradually reopened and house the offices of the management of the Architecture and Design department of the Politecnico di Torino. On 12 May 2007 the splendid room of the Zodiac reopened, with its central fresco which mythologically depicts the river Po with the features of Poseidon.
On February 7, 2018 a seventeenth – century chapel of Castellamonte was presented to the public, walled in the early twentieth century, rediscovered during the restoration of the monumental building.
The building
While the work for the expansion and architectural renovation of the residence was being carried out under the supervision of Carlo and Amedeo di Castellamonte, following the wish of Cristina of France, the decoration of the two first floor apartments on the Noble Residential Floor progressed. The apartments are identical both in number of rooms, both in their disposition, but different in decorative choice. The project wanted a sumptuous decoration using stucco-work and paintings accompanied by “corami” (leather works used like tapestries) on the walls. The works started with the central Great Salon and the apartment facing south, towards Moncalieri, formed by five rooms and a cabinet. The order is given to the family of plasterers and painters, coming from the Lake region, leaded by Isidoro Bianchi, who had already been regularly involved in other Savoy architectural projects such as Rivoli or the Ducal Palace. Bianchi works here assiduously with his sons Pompeo and Francesco between 1633 and 1642.
The main theme chosen for each room is represented by the fresco at the center of the ceiling, as the starting point, and then carried around to the stucco-work and frescos and even to the area just underneath the wall friezes. If the official apartment belonging to Cristina is strongly distinguished by the golden stucco-work and is the master piece of the Bianchi family, the rooms facing north, designated for the young prince Carlo Emanuele, are decorated at the beginning by the Bianchi, and later by other artists belonging to talented families coming from the Lake region, both painters and sculptors, such as the Casella and the Recchi (1633-1646).
The decoration of the apartments is well preserved, even if some rooms were re-decorated and modified during the eighteenth century; the general decorative programme and each episode were master-minded by Count Filippo di San Martino d’Aglié. The Count’s choice of style for the southern apartment rooms facing the Po was based on Ovidio’s poem.
Ground floor
The Ground Floor of the Valentino Castle hosts the Column Room in the center, as the representative room in the XVI century palace, transformed in the first half of the XVII century, as well as some simply painted rooms, not official, probably conceived for the Savoy court private life.
The Noble Residential Floor
An important stucco and frescoes decoration qualifies the first floor of the Castello del Valentino, noble residential floor and representation floor for the court. The “Salone d’Onore” (Hall of Honour) is at the center of a composition of two symmetrical apartments, originally intended for Cristina di Francia and young Carlo Emanuele.
A series of sketches of interiors represents a precious pictorial evidence of the original decoration of the rooms on the noble residential floor. The sketches are stored in an album at the “Biblioteca Reale di Torino” (Royal Library of Turin) and are sometimes annotated in the margins with observations by Leonardo Marini, «disegnatore ordinario delle camere del Re» (ordinary King’s rooms designer) since 1782.
The Great Hall
The great salon represents the heart of the seventeenth century restructured palace, reaching its current dimensions in volume and height. These dimensions were perfectly in keeping with the new monumental access to the west, through the open arcade and the great double staircase; apart from it being a room of honour it also had a privileged view of the Po and the facing hills.
The volume and height of the great salon called for an outstanding quality of decoration and this was brilliantly managed by Isidoro Bianchi. He created a type of never-ending scene on the walls, strengthened by the presence of enormous spiral columns which supported an elaborate balcony with imitation statues.
The great salon was decorated by Isidoro Bianchi and his sons Pompeo and Francesco in the early 1640s; successive work was also done (1677) by the Recchis and Giovanni Battista Cortella – probably in the architectural panelling which scan the historical scenes on the walls.
The general architectural framework was the object of vigorous restoration work done between 1924-26 necessary to conserve it and also to insert plaques and other memorabilia to commemorate those lost in the first world war. These additions were designed by Ludovico Pogliaghi and carried out by one of his disciple Gerolamo Poloni from Milan. The doors were also redone in these years. The general theme of the decor – the exaltation of the origins of the Savoy family by remembering the military feats of the early dukes — includes the rich dynastic history and problems in the times of Carlo Emanuele I, but also how the family adapted to the political climate in the 1640s, stressing the alliance and friendship shared by the Savoys and the Kings of France.
Count Emanuele Tesauro, the author of several publications on rhetoric and the Savoy royal family history, alongside d’Agliè, was probably responsible for choosing the subjects of the paintings and words on the plaques.
The historical scenes start over the entrance door with Filippo II Senza Terra (Lackland) and later duke of Savoy (1443-97) who helped Carlo VIII enter Italy; the plaque explains the dynastic period very clearly and praises Cristina of France: “AD NITENTE PHILIPPO SABAUDO / RESTITUTUS FLORENTIAE PETRUS MEDICAEUS/ ITA CAROLI OCTAVI FIRMAVIT VICTORIAS / UT POST FLORENTIAM CAPTAM FRANCICA / LILIA TOTA PENE ITALIA FLOR UERINT”.
On the right of this painting, the scene presents the natural son of Filippo II, the “gran bastardo” (illegitimate) Renato count of Villars and Tenda, who with Francesco I of France met their death in the Battle of Pavia (1525), as the plaque says: “NUSQUAM NEC IN NOTHIS DEGENERAT SABAUDOR PRINCIPUM IN GALLICOS AMOR / RENATUS MAGNUS SABAUDIAE NOTHUS / POST SPECTATAM DIU PACE ET BELLO FIDEM / FRANCISCO MAGNO IN PAPIENSI PUGNA / UBI HOSTILIU … CADAVER … STRUERE NON POTUIT PECTORE SUO PROPUGNACULUM FECIT”.
One of the original founders of the Savoy household, Aimone the Peaceful (1291-1343), is depicted on the left side of the scenery. He helped the King of France in 1340 against the English in the siege of Tournay. There is also a plaque which explains the event: “NON MINUS HOSTIBUS QUAM SUIS / BONUS AIMON DUPLICI VICTORIA INNOCENS VICTOR / TORNACUM EXPUGNAVIT / ET SERVAVIT”.
On the southern wall, the great central painting is of Amedeo II (who, in current Savoy, genealogy is shown as Amedeo III), who collaborated with Ludovico VII of France when taking Damaskas, but losing his life in Nicosia. The plaque relates: “LUDOVICUS VII AMEDEI II EX SORORE AB IPSA NEPOS / HORTATORE AVUNCULO MORA EXEMPTA / CRUCEM UT IN SUO REGNO DEFENDERET / FRANCICIS LUIS DAMASCENA IN OBSIDIONE FELICITER INSERUERAT / NISI CONCORDEM VIC-TORIAM CETERORUM DISCORDIA / VICISSET / AN MCCCIV” (which corresponds to man).
In the side paintings there is Edoardo the Liberal (1284-1329), allied with Filippo of Valois in the Battle of Montcassel Flanders in 1328. The plaque says: “NON CIVICAM TANTUM EDOARDUS / REGIAM MERENTUR PHILIPPO REGE SERVATO / INGENS SABAUD. VICTORIUARUM / UPER MAJOR …, PUGNATI SABAUD. / POTUIT MONUMEN DEDIT”.
The Battle of Cressy in 1347 is the subject of the painting on the left. It shows it Conte Verde (the Green Count) Amedeo VI who was an ally of Filippo VI di Valois against the English: “NONDUM AMEDEUS VIRIDIS / ADOLESCENTIA MATURUS TRIUMPHAVIT / RESTITUTA FRANCORUM PUGNA EREPTA ANGLIS / VICTORIA ANTE CEPIT HOSTES VINCERE / QUAM POSSET PER AETATEM REGNARE”.
It is difficult to interpret the pain-tings on the wall facing the river Po, partly because they are damaged — especially the central one — and partly because of the lack of the precise description contained in the accompanying plaques. The presence, however, of the Savoy and French colours and members of the respective Royal families, recognisable due to the Fleur-de-lis and Savoy cross, confirm their part in the celebration of the political and military alliances between the two kingdoms in the past centuries.
The central painting on the northern walls is of Amedeo V, who perished in the Battle of Mons en Peulle, between the King of France Filippo IV and Count Roberto of Fiandra — at least that is what the somewhat worn plaque would have us believe: “AUCTORE BELLI LUDOVICO SANCTI REGIS PRONEPOTE AMEDEO V AUXILIATORE BONA PRO CAUSA / SANCTITAS ET BENEFTCENTIA IMPULERUNT / … UT IN MARGARITA FLANDRIAE / REGNANTEM INNOCENTIAM / MCCCIV”.
In the side paintings we find the Green Count Amedeo VI on the right who is entering Costantinople after having participated in the expedition in 1365, and supported by the King of France Giovanni II (the plaque is badly damaged here too). On the left the young Carlo II of Savoia — son of Carlo I and Bianca of Monferrato — welcoming Carlo VIII who is preparing his descent of Naples, and giving him the horse which saved his life in the Battle of Fornovo. The plaque says: “DOCTUS A NATURA AD GALLICA AUXILIA / SEXENNIS CAROLUS IOANNES AMEDEUS / UBI CAROLUM OCTAVUM LIBERALI ORATIO / NE ELOQUENS INFANS EXCEPIT / LIBERALIORI MANU QUIA FERRE POTERAT / AURO ARMATA VICTORIA”.
The Castello di Torino (Palazzo Madama) is easily recognisable in the background. The scenes in the oval pictures which accompany the fresco in the centre of the ceiling, are of mythology and frequently make some reference to Ovidio’s Metamorphosis. As Giovanni Vico had already pointed out, Venus for example, is healing Aeneas who has been wounded by Turno in a duel; the Banquet and the rat of Ippodamia; the Fight of the Centaurs; Bacco’s return from the Indies and the giants who Jove struck by lightning climbing Mount Olympus.
Rooms on the north side
The War Room
This room was already endowed with a brocade tapestry in 1644 and was probably the last room to be decorated by the Bianchis and their team, as we know Pompeo and Francesco were paid in 1645/46 for their stucco work on the ceiling. From this point on the stucco-work became more important in the Valentino apartments than had previously been the case, connecting iconographicaly precisely to the subject matter.
The general frameworks on the ceiling of the War Room are similar to those in the previous rooms as, for example, the four-cornered cornice and corbels decorated, alternately, with roses and framed Fleur-de-lis; the separating border defined by egg moulding above pairs of corbels on acanthus leaves; and lastly the lobed frames of the fresco paintings. What seems decidedly new is the plastic exhuberance of the pair of putti joyously holding up war emblems above the fresco paintings featuring the military feats of Vittorio frames I.
The stucco-work of the frames around the great paintings is very lively with military symbols like shields, helmets and panoplies (suits of armour). The theme of this room is closely linked to the celebration of Vittorio Amedeo I, who the central octagonal plaque addresses: “VICTORIS VICTOR! VICTORIA”. It is also possible to find a more general reference to the military virtue which a prince should aspire to, especially as Carlo Emanuele II was approaching age the was fourteen on 20 June 1648). This apartment was destined for the young heir to the throne and the stucco in these rooms described the typical life style of a prince: hunting, ceremonies and political activity.
In each of the rooms in this apartment there is an abundance of white stucco-work which indicates a approach to design, very different from that of the Bianchis. The style is Alessandro Casella’ s as he was probably working autonomously here at the time. This white stucco-work could emphasise and subordinate or isolate, the individual events of the fresco paintings. The frescos, in fact, were completed altogether, at a later date, by Gian Paolo and Giovanni Antonio Recchi, leading members of a skilled crew from Lugano and employed at the Valentino from 1662.
The War Room features the ‘Vittoria incoronata dalla Fama’ (Fame crowning Victory) in the central painting, while the Genius of History writes about his heroic fests on a large shield. It is possible to recognise glowing praise shown to Vittorio Amedeo I by the presence of his coat-of-arms, the Bird of Paradise, and the four paintings on the lower parts of the wall showing his military feats. Thanks to the analogy with some scenes shown in the Cathedral of Turin, during the funeral procession of the Duke, which had been copied in engravings by Giovenale Boetto, you can identify events that occurred during the War of Monferrato, such as The Siege of Crevalcore and The Conquest of Bestagno.
Alessandro Casella designed the doors in this room, with portraits of Vittorio Amedeo I and Cristina of France above them, and which Vico had already noted, but have only reappeared now after recent restorations.
The Negotiation Room
The stucco-work decoration of this room was carried out by Casella who was paid in 1648. His style is recognisable due to the rich design of telamons (or imposing statues of virile men), putti, angels with plant-like tails, who, in close pairs show the way round the walls to the central painting on the ceiling. The stucco-work on the ceilings of this apartment is very similar to the workmanship on the doors.
The sides of the doorframe are enriched with statuettes holding festoons of flowers and fruit, and above the door there is a border with vegetal-limbed putti on both sides of a frame which was probably designed to hold a portrait of a sovreign.
The fresco in the central panel of the room painted by Recchi is of Peace as the foundation for public happiness, and consists of a series of allegorical figures. Peace, consolidate by well contrived alliances and treatises, including matrimonial ones, even dominates the picture underneath which feature the Savoy family’s relationship with the most prestigious European sovreigns, including the Kings and Queens of France, Spain and England and even oriental Sultans and the Emperor of Asburgh. This multeplicity of relationships justifies the different styles of dress and scenery, but it has yet to be understood completely.
The Room of the Magnificence
The stucco-work in this room was done by Alessandro Casella. The apparent stillness of the decoration around the large central painting and the series of twelve scenes on the vault, is counter-balanced by the vivacious group of stucco putti holding up caryatids (statues of women). The highest border on the walls is brought to life by the ‘metamorphic qualities’ of the lateral volutes in the form of satir head.
The power of the sovreign is the subject of the central painting seen through his liberal activities in patronizing the royal buildings: this very buildings, drawn as a project on a cartouche, are indicated by the sceptre of the sovreing as if already completed.
In the paintings underneath we see featured, before the Theatrum Sabaudiae in 1682, several stately buildings and urban scenes which reflect the purchases made by Carlo Emanuele I or Vittorio Amedeo and Cristina. We can recognise il Palazzo Ducale and Piazza Castello, the Vitozzi church S. Maria al Monte dei Cappuccini and the project by Vittorio Amedeo I for a new palace in the city adjacent to the Dome and for use by the prince heir to the throne. The late sixteenth century suburban residence at Mirafiori seen from the garden is the next subject on the west wall. The new duke had started plans to extend it, but these were interrupted with his death in 1637.
The next subject was the Via Po before its reconstrution into omogeneous arcades by Amedeo of Castellamonte, dominated by the Church of the Minimi Fathers of San Francesco da Paola was set up by Cristina di Francia in 1632. The last painting represents the eminent Porta Nuova complex, build by Carlo di Castellamonte in 1620 at the extreme end of south extension of Turin. Apart from city scenes, there were also territorial landscapes, showing works by the Duke intended to protect religious orders both in churches and in isolated mountain retreats and scenes on the duke’s initiative to fortify cities in the low-lands; recognisable are Trino with its quadrangle citadel; Asti with its double city walls and, probably, Villanova d’Asti.
In the paintings which make up the final border on the walls the scenes depicts, landscapes. The doors to this room boast two spiral columns which frame them and support a fastigium with corbels and putti which are around a circular frame and mirror.
The Celebration and Pomps Room
Gian Paolo Recchi and his team started painting the frescos in this room in 1665, from subjects provided by Filippo d’Aglié, who continued to run the Valentino even after the death of Madama Reale in 1663. In 1665, once the foreman Baguto had put up the scaffolding, Recchi received an advance payment of 300 lire for the paintings ‘to be done in the celebrations and Pomps Room at the Valentino’ and so appointed a plasterer to prepare the walls for painting.
It is no coincidence this room was decorated after the death of Maria Cristina because the large central circular panel in the ceiling shows Her Magnificence the Sovreign, to whom the arts and sciences give eternal fame. As the writing explains: “LUCE MANSURA PER AEVUM” which crowns, the feminine figure, victoriously winged and holding the sceptre which commands, triumphantly in the centre of the panel she is being offered the statue of a young man, which is the symbol of sculpture but which also represents sovreign Genius. The presence in the background of a pyramid reconfirms their belief in the eternity of fame, as Cesare Ripa explains in his Iconografia: It is a worthy attribute to the splendour of princes who build magnificent and sumptuous palaces as eternal wit-nesses to their glory”.
D’Aglié reconfirms this in his “Delizie” where he praises Maria Cristina’s sovreign Genius: “Madama Reale belonging to an illustrions family reflects her divine genius through her ideas, as if in a mirror. This Genius guides, teaches and advises on every aspect of moral and human life, and illuminates the higher intellects with its action. The Genius symbolises the guardian. Madama Reale was the state’s Regent as her son’s tutor. The Elei adored their Genius, Sosiopoli whose name means “Saviour of the People”. Madame Reale is praised as the Saviour of the state, especially during the Civil wars. Ceremonies were dedicated to the Genius of Augustus”.
It is exactly this sentence which explains the link between the decoration of the circular panel and the other frescos which decorate the vault and the rectangular plaques in the freize at the end of the walls. The only plaque which is still intact enough for us to understand is on the west side and shows a public feast in space prepared deliberately for the purpose in front of Palazzo Madama. This facade is dominated by a central ‘Serliana’ window and framed by towers and is comparable to that depicted in the fresco in the salon of Valentino. This fresco shows Carlo VIII’s entry into Turin.
The white stucco-work is dominant in this room too, as it moves uninhibited around the room and oblivious to any architectural obstacles, over the swollen cornice, it almost becomes a garland wrapped up in fruit which frames the central space of the ceiling. The telamoni and putti which join the oval panels and almost completely cover the ceiling, are accompanied by groups of putti supporting the palm leaf the symbol of triumph, in the border of the walls. the different style of stucco works documents the employment of another craftsman in this work: in 1664, payments were registered as “doubles 100 … to the plasterer Corbellino for the stucco-work in the Festivals Room including to the doors he did at the Valentino”. This reference was to Giovanni Luca Corbellino, the same craftsman who had modelled the stucco-work in the columned room.
The Hunt Room
The walls of this room were recovered with red and silver leather in 1644, and just one fresco makes up the decoration of the vaulted ceiling. It features Diana among the nymphs after the hunt and the words “BELLICA FACTA PARANT” are written on a scroll.
The rest of the ceiling is completely covered with Casella’s white stucco-work, which doesn’t limit itself to providing partitions with decorative elements of putti and festoons, but represents a processione of wild animals. The four major wall paintings are then dedicated to these same animals during the hunt – firstly to the hunt of the fawn, then the bear, then the wild pig and lastly the stag. Alongside these fresco scenes painted by Recchi, other minor scenes on the wall freizes shows putti busy in the ac-companying tasks of the hunt. Here Recchi and his team seem to treat their subjects more realistically, like in the ‘Where Flowers Are Born” room where the putti are usefully distilling floral essences. In this case too, they are inside a space covered by a caisson ceiling although this is rather theatrical as each of the scenes is flanked by veils.
Rooms on the south side
The Green Room
The decoration of this room was carried out by Isidoro Bianchi and his team. The 1644 inventory uses the definition ‘green room’ due to the dominating colour of the wall-hanging leather tapestries (green background with golden flowers), and does not use as reference the subject of the painting in the centre of the ceiling, as is the case with the other rooms in the apartment. This leads us to consider the symbolic value of the colour, which is quite evident in all the fresco panels especially in the clothes worn by the characters appearing in them. Bright green symbolises the arrival of spring and a much darker green re-presents death and life-after-death.
The fresco in the centre of the ceiling also seems to have a dual message as it represents both the triumph of Flora through the city’s offering to Maria Cristina (this is how Marini saw it and as well as the nineteenth century restorations), together with other significance, not particularly hidden showing darker events. The picture takes on a funerary aspect owing to the presence of a big bull adorned with floral garlands, accompanyed by three maidens that evoke sacrifical victims. However the painting in the sky of the zodiacal sign of Taurus suggests the re-birth of the bull. Vittorio Amedeo I was born under this sign and his death in 1637 probably prompted this painting. Flora – Maria Cristina, wearing dynastic French-Savoy colours of white, red and blue is no longer represented as she is in the “Where Flowers Are Born” Room happily walking through a world of flowers; but sitting with her arms open wide, her face drawn and tired, surrounded by heavy shadow and near her are empty vases or vases with wilting flowers (a white and a red Fleur-de-lis).
The frames and the motifs in the stucco-work decoration which divide the ceiling and the final border at the top of the walls also cleverly connect frescoed and plastic decoration, and this balance shows a compact and unitary piece of work as confirmed by recent restaurations. But if we study Marini’s eighteenth century sketch, we are perplex by a lot of details carried out on a single parts of framing and on single decorative elements. If the female figures and the vegetal-limbed putti are found in both images, and fit in with the seventeenth century style, the shape of the frames of the panelled frescos and the figures themselves appear quite different, in fact are more similar to pre-nineteenth century style.
The ceiling and the decorated border at the top of the walls are perfectly in keeping with each other and their individual stucco-work and fresco panels have the same importance and value. A pair of acanthus-limbed putti and a painted scene alternate in panelling of the same shape over the border at the top of the walls. The metamorphosis in the stucco-worked figurines represents an ulterior link with the subjects in the frescos mythologcally connected to the birth of plants and flowers described in Ovidio’s ‘Metamorphosis’. This is another ambiguity which dominates this room.
In the four frescos painted on the ceiling there are: Hyacinthus, on the ground having been hit by the discus thrown by the Phoebus, and whose blood generates the flower of the same name (Hyacinth); Pyramus and Thisbe separated by a river of blood and from which a bright red Lily is growing; Prometheus whose liver is being eaten by an eagle, and then renewed and then eaten again, is depicted here lying on the ground with his chest torn open and Jonquils (Daffodils) growing where his blood falls; and Ajax, unable to stand not being awarded a war-trophy, throws himself on his sword and from his blood a red Hyacinth grows. All four stories show the theme of a hero’s death and his re-generation in the form of a flower which immediately brings to mind, once again, the death of the Savoy hero Vittorio Amedeo in 1637. This adds to the already commemorative aura of the room. The paintings in the border at the top of the walls were also inspired by Ovidio’s Metamorphosis, but were further enriched by d’Agliè in paintings where the female presence is more significant than the male’s.
On the western wall there is, as d’Agliè describes “Helena resting on a tombstone, crying and from her tears Elenii is born” and King Midas’ Banquet. On the southern wall there is.Venus on a chariot pulled by swans and accompanied by Eros. At their feet grow a white and a red lily (according to d’Agliè’s explanation); Narcissus is looking at his reflection in the spring-water and flowers of the same name, Narcissus (or Daffodils) are growing on the bank nearby. On the eastern wall we find Hercules and Mercury and, finally on the northern wall there is Driope, with his son Anfisso and sister Loti at the moment when, having collected the branches of a lotus plant (which had just been transformed from a nymph), he is turned into one too. And finally the myth of Clizia, who having been turned into a sunflower, continues to face the sun.
The interlaced monogrammes of Vittorio Amedeo and Cristina on the corners of the frame of the central fresco in the ceiling, suggest a decided reference to the complex affairs of the ducal family between 1637 and 1640. These years were characterised by the death of the duke, and his wife Maria Cristina’s defence of her power once she had become Regent and her determination to preserve this power and hand it down to her son. The city’s offer to the duchess, the hero myth and the continuation of life after death, suggest this room was destined for official Regency use – it is no coincidence it immediately adjoins the great salon where the whole heroic Savoy history is celebrated.
The Rose Room
This room was originally decorated by Isidoro Bianchi and his collaborators; but since then a large part of their work has been heavily ‘re-touched’, including the stucco-work, and in places is completely damaged, like the circular panel in the centre of the ceiling: “A painting of figures representing Venus and Mars” still visible in the eighteenth century was substituted, in the midnineteenth century, by another with “a Fama bearing the Madama Reale coat-of-arms and painted by one of the disciples of Professor Gaetano Ferri”.
The painting of Venus and Mars – clearly modelled on Cristina and Amedeo – dominated the centre of the vaulted ceiling whose dome has been erected on a circular drum, encompassed in several sections by a series of putti on corbels. This drum is connected to the square room below by four angular groups of stucco putti as pedentives. The Savoy Rose coat-of-arms, reinforced as the symbol awarding to Vittorio Amedeo of the longed-for Royal title the king of Cyprus, in 1632, appears prolifically on all the frames which, in rigorous architectural succession make up the vault, both in those with lands, and with corbels and coffering.
It is difficult to determine what pro-portion of these roses dates back to the seventeenth century, and what dates back to the excessive glorification of Savoy in the nineteenth century. When one bears in mind, for example, the expanse of roses scrolls which now forms the first cornice in the vault, and was described by Leonardo Marini in the late eighteenth century as a “corbel with olive leaves”.
The motiv of stucco putti form a link between the drum and the fresco painted frieze at the top of the walls. The sixteen stucco putti on the arched ceiling divide this space by framing the panels adorned by garlands of flowers and fruit, and other winged putti were frescoed on the walls in pairs by Isidoro Bianchi under the lobed-cum-linear frames and on a gilded background. Each pair of putti is in mid-flight and playing with a motif of the Savoy coat-of-arms like the Cyprus Rose and the knightly insignia, the “Collare dell’Annunziata”.
The doors, originally carved by Casella, were totally re-done in the nineteenth century “from Domenico Ferri’s designs by the sculptor Isella as they were so badly reduced”. Busts of Emanuele Filiberto and Margherita of Valois on the south and north doors, and Maria Giovanna Battista on the west door were also sculpted by Isella.
The current tapestry which imitates a sample of mock damask not antique left in full view in a corner of the room. It stops one from imagining the original red and gold harmony of the room whose walls were enhanced by “a leather tapestry of red background and embossed golden flowers” which gave it a royal and stately appearance. There was even space for “four circular paintings, which represented the four elements” painted by Albani and currently in the Savoy Gallery, in Turin. This room was certainly of a state room, and not, as has been frequently written, the duchess’ bedroom, as the 1644 inventory explains that the bedrooms were on the floor below. Amongst these bedrooms there was one with silver-thread royal bedlinen and dark blue and gold-fringed satin cushions together with a gilded balustrade around the bed. This room was directly under the Fleur-de-lis room.
The Fleur-de-lis Room
Isidoro Bianchi and his assistants decorated this room, starting at the large central panel which, in the late eighteenth century, was described as being filled with a large painting of ‘natural subjects’, but without specifying the subject. In later centuries other artists also worked in this room and now all that is left of this masterpiece is just a simple painting in blue which was probably done in the later nineteenth century. Domenico Ferri carried out extensive restoration work throughout the inside of the Valentino around this time and a lot of his work is still evident in this room.
In fact, possibly the large stucco frieze which connected this central painting to the walls has preserved only the articulation of the vault in its original form with triangular coves at corners and rectangular coves above the walls. This ceiling design faithfully follow the general lines of the original model documented in the sketches drawn by Leonardo Marini after he was nominated in 1775 by Vittorio Amedeo II as architect and decorator of the Regi Palazzi (The Royal Palaces). The sketch where Marini illustrates a part of this decorative border shows the subtle elegance of a female figure used as a column (or caryatid) connected by floral decorations to the simple architectonic frame of the adjacent niche wich houses two putti holding an amphora (a two-handled jar used by Romans and Greeks). The subtle decor created by the scrolls, candelabras and the caryatid’s garlands reminds one of the decor in the ‘golden flowers cabinet’.
The style left today however, shows the room as having been heavily influenced by the Green Room – to the extent that it was probably the object of deliberate and simultaneous restoration projects. Even the obsessive and insistent use of the Fleur-de-lis appears to be part of an eighteenth century ‘horror vacui’ (a fear of emptiness) criteria to disguise these major changes in the placing of amphoras and statuettes. Marini clearly documents a white ‘face’ whose details are ‘picked out in gold’. This same sequence of colours reappears, this time inverted, on the tapestry which the 1644 inventory describes as “a floral and colourful leather tapestry with gold background, made in Flanders”. Another original feature appears to be the border between the walls and the ceiling, where, within thin stucco frames, Isidoro Bianchi had painted an uninterrupted line of putti playing with ribbons inscribed with Italian and French verses and twisting them around Fleur-de-lis. The dance of the putti, represented by figures in the foreground, actually take place in the background.
This is an interior single space well definied by cove ceiling in perspective decorated with scrolls and royal monograms quite similar to those in the room entitled ‘Where Flowers are Born’. In the Fleur-de-lis room the corners of the painted freize are enhanced by the presence of two acanthus-limbed putti in golden stucco and flanked by lion heads. Energetic restorations seem to characterise the nineteenth century – even in fact, to the painting and sculpture over the doors and frames orginally done by Alessandro Casella in 1646.
Attic
Hiding an extraordinary architecture, the highly pitched roof, which characterized the river residence, was composed of a complex wooden warping, which propped some planking fastened slate sheets. On the first building site, some specialized workforces came from Savoy: coordinated by La Fortune, they built the roof of the palace parallel to the river Po, the roof of the two towers towards Turin and completed the pavillon-système model.
In 1858, when the palace was chosen as seat of the Sesta Esposizione nazionale dei prodotti di industria (Sixth National Exposition of Industrial Products), Domenico Ferri, in substitution of the previous terraces, designed two wings to link the pavilions, by adopting new techniques characterizing the XIX century.
According to the archives, in the first twenty years of the XVII century, larch and pine, as woody species which can be still identified at present, were used. Studies and research show that the Castle underwent a continuous and coordinated maintenance works in the modern age by qualified staff in charge of all the ducal factories in Piedmont and since the years when the Castle has been the seat the Turin Polytechnic School by professors and by the staff working in the university laboratories.
On the occasion of the Centenary of the Italian Unification, in 1961, a group of designers decided to maintain the XVII century roof-pillars: this represented an uncommon choice for the period. At the end of the XX century, Politecnico supported other works, based on metric survey, on diagnostic studies and on structural analysis, as well as the routine and the emergency maintenance works.
The roof-pillars are organized in an exceptional structure, far from the Italian one, essentially done by some overlapping squares, built in solid wood, parallel to the eave walls.The roof covering, supported by a complex shell, is composed of slate sheets. The pavilion roofing structure is characterized by sloping pitches, with planking fastened slate sheets, supported by wooden roof trusses.
At the end of the XX century, around 1989, the wooden warping of the Valentino Castle was subjected to studies and research with the aim of restoring the decay subsequent to 1961 works, when the roofing was replaced by slate from Liguria, which was known to be easily subject to frost degradation and not appropriate to continental climate areas.
The works, which had been carried out through traditional techniques, were supported by thorough research providing data on the structure, on the static scheme, on wood physical properties, on its dating, on its degradation condition. Thanks to the accurate information emerging from these studies, it was possible to modify the structure and complete the restoration work.
In the following decades, thanks to the most modern techniques and study technologies, new research points emerged, aiming continuously to maintain the technological and construction properties of the original building.
Cultural Heritage
Libraries and Archives safeguard the historical and cultural Heritage of Politecnico, as well as favoring the enhancement of their value. The richness of the preserved documentary collections (books and archives) reflects the cultural vitality of the university that, during the years, as a complement of its two-fold Institutional mission in Education and Research, acquired several documents of high scientific value, through charitable contributions and purchases.
Archives and Libraries in the Valentino Castle perform a three-fold function: safeguarding and protecting the cultural heritage, making it available to the interested scholars and citizens and enhancing its value also through the creation of exhibition itineraries open at a territory level.
The historical documentation has been only partly object of reorganization and inventory and interventions aimed at the creation of complementary tools which can facilitate the consultation and the knowledge of the history of the Politecnico, as well as of the Architecture, in particular by scholars and researchers, are now in progress. The synergy between the structures, which, with different roles, are in charge of the protection and enhancement of the value of the historical memory of Politecnico, will surely favor the impressive description work of the preserved documentation and the related opportunity to make use of it.
Furthermore, libraries perform the function of the knowledge organization and of educational and research support with a particular attention to new technologies, also in view of a knowledge free access.