Church of San Cataldo

The founding of the church is habitually placed in the years immediately following the mid-12th century. Its construction is traditionally attributed to Maione da Bari during the years he served as Great Admiral, or prime minister, between 1154 and 1160. His Apulian origin may, in fact, explain both the choice of the dedication itself to San Cataldo, Bishop of Taranto, and the choice of the architectural design adopted for the church, which features a sequence of three domesaligned on the axis across the roof. After Maione's assassination in 1160, his properties were transferred to Silvestro, whose son, Guglielmo, subsequently put them up for sale along with the chapel "in predictis domibus costructa" (constructed in the aforesaid houses), clearly identifiable as San Cataldo.

Despite being granted to the Archbishop of Monreale since 1182, this fact did not prevent the radical transformations carried out in the subsequent centuries, including a sort of "engulfing" of the church within new buildings. It is highly plausible that San Cataldo maintained its original configuration until the end of the 17th century, when the Archbishop of Monreale, Giovanni Roano, promoted the “restoration and embellishments” of the building in 1679, works commemorated in an inscription still visible above the entrance door. The church was later incorporated into a neoclassical structure by the architect Alessandro Emmanuele Marvuglia.

In 1867, the Post Office management decided to use the chapel as well for certain tasks, designating it as the office for mail distribution.

In 1882, after various vicissitudes, the church was restored by Giuseppe Patricolo. The work was completed in the early months of 1885, when a dark red plaster coating was applied to the domes. This color, which characterizes other Norman monuments in Palermo, is, therefore, a nineteenth-century invention. The building we appreciate today is essentially the architectural structure restored by Patricolo's work, although we must note some transformations carried out both inside the church and in its immediate vicinity during the 20th century. The first of these interventions dates back to the acquisition of the church by the Knights of the Holy Sepulchre, who restored the chapel and returned it to worship in 1937, as recorded on the plaque placed on the southern wall inside the church:

ORDO EQU.SCTIU SEPULCRI HIER / ALOYSIO CARD. LAVITRANO PROTEC / TORE COLMITE JOANNE LO BUE / DE LEMOS IN SICILIA LOCUMTE / NENTE RESTAURAVIT AC DIVINO CULTUI RESTITUIT A.D. MCMXXXVII

The works undertaken on that occasion included the placement of marble columns in the corner recesses of the apses, which still feature the crusader symbol of the knights on their capitals today, and the closing of the windows with transenna (screened) fixtures.

The second intervention concerns the demolition of the seventeenth-century building facing Via Maqueda, which was damaged by the 1943 bombings and finally removed in 1948. Following this demolition, a small square was created at the foot of the basement upon which the church now stands, where a fragment of the ancient Punic urban walls was brought to light.

The pavement with marble inlays and slabs of porphyry and serpentine, although integrated by restorations, still substantially preserves its precious original configuration.

The small church holds the burial of little Matilda, daughter of Silvestro, who died in 1161, as gathered from the inscription still visible today on one of the internal walls of the church, opposite the entrance:

EGREGI COMITIS SILVESTRI NATA MATILDIS / NATA DIE MARTIS, MARTIS ADEMPTA DIE / VIVENS TER TERNOS HABUIT MENSES OBIITQUE / DANS ANIMAM COELIS, CORPUS INANE SOLO / HAEC ANNIS DOMINI CENTUM UNDECIES SEMEL UNO / ET DECIES SENIS HAC REQUIEVIT HUMO

The Church of San Cataldo is entrusted to the Equestrian Order of the Holy Sepulchre of Jerusalem – Lieutenancy of Italy Sicily / Section of Palermo. Since July 3, 2015, it has been part of the UNESCO World Heritage Site within the "Arab-Norman Palermo and the Cathedral Churches of Cefalù and Monreale" route.