Description
The Palace of Justice, known as Palazzo Piacentini after its architect, is Messina's courthouse, on Piazza Maurolico across from the University: a golden neoclassical temple crowned by a bronze quadriga.
At the top stands the quadriga driven by Minerva, a symbol of justice, cast by Ercole Drei in an alloy of bronze and aluminum. The facade in golden-toned Solunto stone bears the faces of Messina's jurists of the past, among them the philosopher Dicaearchus of Messana.
Marcello Piacentini designed it in 1912, but World War I halted the work. When it resumed, in 1923, the structure stayed the same, while the facade switched from Neo-Renaissance to a Doric style inspired by Sicily's temples and by the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin.
It opened in 1928 where the Great Hospital had stood, destroyed by the 1908 earthquake. In 1986 its courtrooms hosted the Messina maxi-trial against three of the city's Mafia clans and one from Barcellona Pozzo di Gotto.
At the top stands the quadriga driven by Minerva, a symbol of justice, cast by Ercole Drei in an alloy of bronze and aluminum. The facade in golden-toned Solunto stone bears the faces of Messina's jurists of the past, among them the philosopher Dicaearchus of Messana.
Marcello Piacentini designed it in 1912, but World War I halted the work. When it resumed, in 1923, the structure stayed the same, while the facade switched from Neo-Renaissance to a Doric style inspired by Sicily's temples and by the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin.
It opened in 1928 where the Great Hospital had stood, destroyed by the 1908 earthquake. In 1986 its courtrooms hosted the Messina maxi-trial against three of the city's Mafia clans and one from Barcellona Pozzo di Gotto.