After the Swabian period, when it was a state town, in 1439, Salerno was subjected to the Orsini and then, in 1463, to the Sanseverino, keeping in this condition a role of capital of an independent State and of connection between Naples and the provinces of the Principality.

With the Spaniards’ arrival, especially for the progressive attractive power of Naples, capital and large city, Salerno underwent a process of provincialization that prevented it from emerging towards the smaller towns.

After the conspiracy of the latest prince of Salerno, Ferrante Sanseverino, against the Spanish viceroy Toledo (1557), the city was taken away to the Sanseverino and made state town before being sold, in 1578, to the merchant Nicholas Grimaldi, Duke of Eboli. Finally, in 1590, with a payment of 90,000 ducats, it managed to become state town again.

In the 16th century, Salerno lived a difficult transition from being center of a great feudal “government” to a modest urban reality in the new Spanish state organization. For that, in this period its hamlets had an independent economic activity and a much wider population than the city center, so that it was defined “absent city”.

In Salerno there are four churches that present the typical elements of Renaissance sacred buildings: the church of S. Salvatore de Fondaco, located along via Mercanti, that of S. Anna al Porto, near the Giuseppe Verdi theater, the chapel of S. Filippo Neri, at the former Capuchin convent, close to the ancient eastern walls of the city and the church of Monte dei Morti off Plebiscito, near the ancient Porta Rotese. The church of Monte dei Morti was built in 1530, that of S. Anna at the end of the sixteenth century and that of S. Salvatore acquired the octagonal shape between 1582 and 1584 so it is likely that the architect who designed the octagonal matrix was it was the same for all churches.