In 1838 word reached Noto that Ferdinand II of Bourbon was coming, and the town built him a gateway: the design is by the Neapolitan architect Angelini and the arch was finished in the same year, looking as it still does today. The same man made the statue of the king, which later changed jobs and became the town's war memorial.
What to see
The Porta Reale, also called the Ferdinandea, is the monumental way into the old town and opens corso Vittorio Emanuele, the axis along which the cathedral, Palazzo Ducezio and the three main squares are lined up. It is a free-standing arch, not the gap in a defensive wall: it was built as a threshold of honour for a royal visit and stayed on as the gate of a town that had no need of walls.
Before the arch went up, this side of the settlement was closed off by a wide muddy ravine planted with trees, and beyond the ravine stood the Capuchin friary: the gate marks the point where the town looked outwards. The stone is the local limestone, the same used in the rebuilding that followed the earthquake of 1693, the one that turns golden in low sun and makes the whole centre of Noto recognisable.
Visiting
There is no ticket and no opening time: the arch stands in the open at one end of the corso, and a few minutes are enough to look at it. Leave the car outside the centre and arrive on foot, because from here on you walk: from the gate to the cathedral and Palazzo Ducezio is about ten minutes of gentle climb, with Baroque palaces one after another. The square in front of the arch was reworked by the town council in 2014.
Our editors' tip
Come back twice, by day and after sunset: the night lighting lifts the arch off the dark background and the photograph changes completely. Then go and find the war memorial: that statue began as a portrait of Ferdinand II, the king the gate was built for, and it is the oddest sequel to this story. The historic centre has been on the UNESCO list since 2002, among the late Baroque towns of the Val di Noto, and the gate is the right place to start walking.