Google “Naples, Italy” and you will immediately learn it is the birthplace of pizza. Google “Naples, Italy” and “art” and you will discover it to be one of the country’s most underrated cities for art. A brief history lesson reminds us that Naples was once the center of the Bourbon dynasty.

The city’s art historical hub, the Museo di Capodimonte (translated to head of the mountain) is situated on a hilltop overlooking the Bay of Naples and seamlessly pairs a superb art collection and majestic compound. King Charles (1716-1788), first Charles VII of Naples and Sicily and later Charles III of Spain, formed the collection in the 1730s as he built a stately country palace to house his expanding court and extensive art collection (featuring noteworthy examples of every form of art from coins and gems to paintings and bronzes) he inherited from his mother Queen of Spain, Elizabetta Farnese (1692-1766).