A scenographic solution for a Neapolitan bridge in the beginning of nineteenth century

Object of the present study is the masonry bridge, still standing, built for King Ferdinand I of Bourbon, in 1818, by the court scenographer and architect Antonio Niccolini, in the Villa Floridiana Park in Naples. The original drawing, plan and front view, of Niccolini’s design is kept in the Archive of the Saint Martin Museum in Naples. The bridge, made of Neapolitan tuff and bricks, with a single polycentric arch, spanning thirty metres, can be ascribed to the typology of lightened tympanum bridges, in which continuum masonry in the backfills is substituted by a system of vaults leaning upon the extrados of the underlying arch. The static behaviour of the bridge will be studied, basing upon a detailed survey and an accurate examination of the historical sources, also employing the graphical methods known at the age of its realization.