The Royal Palace of Caserta was commissioned by the King of Naples Carlo di Borbone, who, taken from a "competition" with the French royals and eager to donate to Naples structures that could play a role of capital-city of European level [4 ], decided to inaugurate a palace that could rival in magnificence and grandeur with that of Versailles [5]. For security reasons, the chosen location was Casertavecchia, about 15 km north of the capital (see British naval expedition against Naples in 1742).
After the refusal of Nicola Salvi, afflicted by serious health problems, the sovereign turned to the architect Luigi Vanvitelli, at that time engaged in restoration work on the Basilica of Loreto on behalf of the Papal States. Charles of Bourbon obtained from the Pope to be able to commission the artist and in the meantime acquired the necessary area, where the sixteenth-century palace of the Acquaviva stood, by their heir Duke Michelangelo Caetani, paying him 489,343 ducats, a sum that although enormous was certainly the subject of a strong discount: Gaetani, in fact, had already undergone the confiscation of a part of the patrimony for his anti-Bourbon past.
The king asked that the project include, in addition to the palace, the park and the arrangement of the surrounding urban area, with supplies from a new aqueduct (Carolino Aqueduct) that crossed the adjoining complex of San Leucio. The new palace had to be a symbol of the new Bourbon state and show power and grandeur, but also be efficient and rational.
The project was part of the broader political plan of King Charles of Bourbon, who probably also wanted to move some administrative structures of the State into the new Palace, connecting it to the capital Naples with a monumental avenue of over 15 km. However, this plan was only partially realized; even the royal palace itself was not completed with the dome and corner towers originally planned.
Vanvitelli arrived in Caserta in 1751 and immediately began to design the building, commissioned with the obligation to make it one of the most beautiful in Europe. On November 22 of that year the architect submitted the final draft for approval to the King of Naples. Two months later, on January 20, 1752, the king's birthday, during a solemn ceremony in the presence of the royal family with squadrons of cavalry and dragons that marked the perimeter of the building, the first stone was laid. This moment is remembered by the fresco by Gennaro Maldarelli that stands out in the vault of the Throne Room.
The Pharaonic work that the King of Naples had requested prompted Vanvitelli to surround himself with valid collaborators: Marcello Fronton joined him in the work of the palace, Francesco Collecini in those of the park and the aqueduct, while Martin Biancour, from Paris, was appointed head -gardener. The following year, when the works of the palace were already well under way, construction of the park began. The work lasted a total of several years and some details remained unfinished. In 1759, in fact, Charles of Bourbon of Naples had ascended the throne of Spain (with the name of Charles III) and had left Naples for Madrid.
The sovereigns who succeeded him, Joachim Murat, who gave a certain contribution to the embellishment of the palace, Ferdinand IV (later Ferdinand I of the Two Sicilies), Francesco I, Ferdinand II and Francesco II, with whom he ended in Italy the Bourbon dynasty did not share the same enthusiasm as Charles of Bourbon for the construction of the Palace. Moreover, while still in the XVIII century it was not difficult to find economic labor thanks to the so-called barbarian captured by the Neapolitan ships in the operations of repression of the piracy practiced by the coastal populations of North Africa, this source of labor will be removed in the following century with the French control of Algeria .
Finally, on 1 March 1773 Vanvitelli died, succeeded by his son Carlo: he, also a worthy architect, was less fanciful and stubborn than his father, to the point that he found it difficult to do the work according to his father's plan.
In 1787 the writer Goethe came to the Palace while he was performing his Grand Tour, which astonished by the gardens described this visit:
«The location is of exceptional beauty, in the most luxuriant plain of the world, but with extensive gardens that extend to the hills; an aqueduct induces an entire river, which water the palace and its vicinity, and this water mass can be transformed, pouring it on artificial rocks, into a wonderful waterfall. The gardens are beautiful and harmonize very much with this district which is a single garden. "
