Duomo

Lonely Planet review

Every year in May, September and December thousands gather in the Duomo to pray for a miracle - that the blood of the city's patron saint San Gennaro, kept here in two phials, will liquefy and save Naples from any potential disaster. When the miracle failed to occur in 1944, Vesuvius erupted. When it failed in 1980, the city was hit by a devastating earthquake.

Vast and stunning, Naples' spiritual centrepiece sits on the site of earlier churches, themselves preceded by a pagan temple to Neptune. Begun by Charles I of Anjou in 1272 and consecrated in 1315, it was largely destroyed in a 1456 earthquake. Copious nips and tucks over the centuries, including the addition of a late-19th-century neo-Gothic facade, have created a melange of styles and influences.

Hidden away in a strongbox behind the altar is a 14th-century silver bust in which sits the skull of San Gennaro and the two phials which hold his miraculous blood.

The next chapel eastwards contains an urn with the saint's bones and a cupboard full of femurs, tibias and fibulas. Below the high altar is the Cappella Carafa, a Renaissance chapel built to house yet more of the saint's remains.