Overview
It is looking at the Barletta Castle that you can retrace the history of the city in a single moment, from the Middle Ages to the modern age. Frederick II of Swabia had it built on Norman fortifications, adapting them to a quadrangular, efficient and rational plan, and carved out residential spaces inside it worthy of an imperial court, so that he could stay there for a long time. Then the castle was reinforced at the end of the 13th century by Pierre d'Angicourt, a great architect under the orders of the Anjou family, in the second half of the 15th century by the new Aragonese lords, and in the middle of the 16th century by Spanish engineers in the service of Charles V of Habsburg, who added corner ramparts and dug moats. The result was what we can still largely admire today: a solid quadrangular structure, with corners defended by pentagonal ramparts and a moat that ran around three sides, while the northern side at the time faced directly onto the coast. Today, the castle houses the Civic Museum of Barletta.
