Il Palazzo dei Consoli, clearly visible even from afar, is located in the historic center of Gubbio. Its facade faces the Piazza Grande, a hanging terrace, the political hub of the fourteenth-century city.
The building houses the Civic Museum, inside which one can see the Eugubine Tables, a precious bronze testimony of the Umbrian language.
The palace was erected between 1332 and 1349 based on a design by Angelo da Orvieto (remembered in an inscription engraved above the arch of the entrance door) with the contribution of Matteo di Giovannello called il Gattapone.
With a rectangular plan, it features a great Gothic thrust accentuated by vertical lesenes that divide the front into three distinct parts.
The first floor is occupied by the portal, accessed via a fan-shaped staircase; in the lunette there is a fresco by Bernardino di Nanni of Eugenia with Madonna and Child between St. John the Baptist and St. Ubaldo (1495). The painting was heavily modified in the sixteenth century by Benedetto Nucci. On both sides of the portal there are two full-centered biforas.
The second floor is adorned with six full-centered windows surmounted by a dentil cornice that connects the arches.
The palace features a crenellated crowning embellished with ogival arches; to the left rises the bell tower.
The right side and the rear part, visible from Via dei Consoli, maintain forms very similar to the facade. On the left side, another building body made up of a portico that descended to Via Baldassini has been attached.
The entire first floor is occupied by the Arengo hall, covered by grand barrel vaults, which also houses part of the city’s stone collection.
The Palazzo dei Consoli, as well as the unfinished Palazzo Pretorio, was built during the first half of the 14th century at a time of strong city expansion. Indeed, there was a need to equip oneself with an adequate public space in accordance with the economic and political power that Gubbio now exercised over its territory. The ancient Platea Communis, in the upper part, was thus abandoned, and the splendid hanging square was built just below, a directional center that had to be adjacent to all the neighborhoods, but external to each of them and precisely for this reason a point of impartial connection in political matters.
Information about Palazzo dei Consoli
Piazza Grande, 1
06024 Gubbio (Perugia)
0759274298
serviziculturali@comune.gubbio.pg.it
https://www.comune.gubbio.pg.it
Source: MIBACT
