The Cathedral of Monreale, with its cloister and its supplementary monastery, account for one of the main architectural marvels of the medieval world. The sacred building stands isolated on the edge of the oldest part of the small city of Monreale dominating the valley of the Oreto stream and the famous "Conca d’Oro". Founded by Guillaume II in 1172, it was finished around 1176, but some works will continue until the XIII century. The golden temple was the heart of a new royal citadel dreamed by the young king Siculo-Norman.
The style is of Latin-Norman type, with a relatively prominent transept. The basilica body, tripartite, is divided by columns and marquees, probably borrowed from buildings at the end of the empire, as did the cathedral of Cefalù and the Palatine chapel of Palermo constructed by Roger, the grand-father of Guillaume II. The nave doesn't present any tribunes, as in all Norman churches of Sicily:this solution permits one to increase the surfaces covered with mosaics.
The choir of three apses is raised in relation to the three vessels of the nave. It is placed in central position marked by four big pillars, that doesn't sustain the dome roof as in the Palatine Chapel.
The arches give a structural effect of remarkable perspective. They focus the volumes toward the apse’s pan, dominated by the majestic face of Christ Pantocrator; The western entrance, in the same way that the Cathedral of Cefalù, is enclosed between two towers of Norman type.
The cycle of the mosaics (about six thousand square meters) is one of the biggest and the most precious of the middle Ages not only because of its original artistic value, but also because of its exceptional effect, on the representational, theological and cosmological plan, of the scenes of the old and the New Will.
The cloister, of clinician type, sustained by geminate colonnades, reflects the big artistic value of the Sicilian craftsmen that knew how to conjugate Byzantine, Arabian and Norman decorative themes. The monastery, partially in ruins, also presents a very big interest.