Steripinto Palace

Build in 1501 by Antonio Noceto, nephew of the renowned botanist Gerardo Noceto (1475-1545), Steripinto is one of the oldest palaces in Sciacca and constitutes one of the most interesting examples of Plateresque art in Sicily, in whose structural and morphological features are blended late Catalan Gothic and Italian Renaissance. The name Steripinto comes from the fusion of the noun hosterium, a common name for other medieval palaces in Sicily, meaning fortified palace, and the past participle pictum, to the letter, painted, but it can also be translated as adorned.

The façade is characterised by an uninterrupted series of bosses of diamond pointed stones with a beautiful decorative effect. The two marble columns are of noteworthy elegance, inserted in the two cantonal at the sides of the façade, possibly taken from an older demolished building. The coat of arms at the centre of the semi-circle, above the portal, is of the Lucchesi Palli, the family to whom the building was passed down through marriage. The coat of arms on the capitals of the columns of the mullioned windows is, however, of the Noceto (whose symbol is a walnut tree). The interior, greatly altered over the course of centuries, preserves a beautiful cross-ribbed vault, supported by robust pointed arches.