The church of Saint Chiara was ordered by Sancia di Maiorca, wife of Robert of Anjou King of the Neapolitan Kingdom, in order to give hospitality to the Clarisse Order being unable to gratify her calling to the monastic life.

This religious building is one of the most important of the Middle-Ages in Naples and nowadays is ruled by the Franciscan Order.

Built between 1310 and 1328 in Provençal-Gothic style, the church houses the imposing tombs of the Anjou, testifying to the artistic activity of Tino da Camaino in Naples, one of the greatest sculptors of the XIV century from Siena.

Behind the main altar the funerary monument of Robert of Anjou, from the beginning of the 1400’s, overlooks the whole interior of the church.

In Saint Chiara the lightness of the Gothic blends with the vigour of the Romanic elements such as the arches of the side chapels and in the timber ceiling.

Noteworthy is the baroque Royal chapel of the Bourbon, where some members of the Royal Spanish House of the Bourbon are buried.

The church was strongly damaged in the bombing of 1943 and at the beginning of the fifties it was rebuilt exactly like the original Middle-Age building.

Its majolica cloister, behind the church, was once an enclosed convent of Clarisses.

It was embellished in 1740 by a Neapolitan artist, Antonio Domenico Vaccaro, who covered the columns and the benches with colourful typical Mediterranean majolica tiles making it a masterpiece of the Rococo style in Italy.

The frescoes of the inner walls from 1600’s, show scenes about the life of the Franciscan Order.

An artistic handmade Neapolitan crib of the XVIII century is kept inside, which is considered a great expression of local art carried out by Neapolitan handcrafters.

The small Museum of the cloister preserves some original sculptures of the Middle-Ages saved from the bombing of the last world war.

Some ruins of a Roman thermal bath, visible under the cloister demonstrate that this area was an elegant, residential living-quarter of the Roman city of Neapolis in the I century A.D.