Rub shoulders with royalty A former hunting lodge set on a wild stretch of coast south of Amalfi offers Stephen Pritchard a real sense of history and a real prince.

The Observer Sunday February 18 2007

A jewel in Italy's crown... Annunziata church on the Amalfi coast. Photograph: Getty History weighs heavy on the shoulders of Angelo, the last , as he paces the vaulted corridors of his grand palazzo by the sea. Staring down at him are portraits of his ancestors cardinals, ambassadors and ministers, even a Pope. When he finally slips away, a remnant of Italy's longforgotten monarchy will be lost for ever.

Like Prince Salinas in Lampadusa's The Leopard, a noble melancholy hangs about him as he ponders his family's demise amid the mementoes that decorate his silent, private apartments. Angelo 13th Prince of Belmonte, 6th Prince of Muro Leccese, 13th Duke of Acerenza and Grandee of Spain 1St Class, 6th Duke of Corrigliano d'Otranto, 10th Marquess of Argensola, 15th Marquess of , 9th Marquess of San Vicente, 7th Marquess of , 12th Count of . 14th Baron of Badolato, 14th Baron of Belmonte, Baron of Rocca Cilento and Tresino, Seigneur of Veglie and Leverano confesses that this romantic reflection sometimes gets the better of him and he will fall to singing old Neopolitan love songs as the waves lap the shore under a shimmering Mediterranean moon.

Fictional Prince Salinas broods magnificently amid the sweltering heat of Sicily; Angelo does the same a little further north, on the shores of the Cilento peninsula, in the 'Magna Grecia', at the southern tip of the Bay of . But that brooding doesn't last long. Angelo is a generous host and a dazzling smile is never far from his lips; indeed, he loves nothing better than to sit around a table with friends and laugh at life, which is fitting in a place built for pleasure.

This imposing place (Angelo still doesn't know every room) was raised 400 years ago as a huge hunting lodge. Successive kings of Spain and Italy came here to pursue the hapless fauna and relax, away from the scheming courts of Madrid and Naples. Today, it offers hospitality to less exalted visitors; people from all over the world who enjoy its glorious setting, its discreet apartments and the realisation that they are holidaying in the home of a real prince who they will probably meet, strolling amid the hibiscus, jasmine and oleander of the gardens or out in the pretty harbour town of

Santa Maria di Castellabate, which snuggles up against the walls of the palazzo. To walk about it with Angelo is to hear faint echoes of the old days of deference. 'Principe', the locals murmur as he strolls past, smiling, shaking hands and calling everyone by name. 'I know everybody hereabouts,' he told me. 'My family has been here so long.

Of Spanish origin, they first arrived in a 10thcentury invasion. By 1300, they had occupied the impressive fortress that hangs on a hill above the palazzo at Castellabate, an ownership that continued until the 1930s, when Angelo's greatgrandfather thought the castle brought bad luck and sold it. He was right: its new owners all died violent deaths.

Today, the gracious palazzo and the nearby wild coastline of the Punta Licosa are all that remain of the Belmonte estates which once covered swathes of southern Italy and Spain and were famous for their olives and wine which made the family rich and powerful. With this wealth they built a huge, frescoed palace in Naples and consolidated their influence in the region: Belmonte wine filled the cellars of Madrid when Carlo III of Naples became King of Spain.

Now you can sense something of this high life in this gracious setting. Apartments, all named after scented herbs and flowers in the fiveacre garden, have been carved out of the main building (Angelo keeps to himself on the north side of the palazzo's courtyard) and others built discreetly among the cypresses and palms of the gardens bring the room count to 50. Some, converted from storehouses, still have large iron rings in their high, vaulted ceilings where bails of corn, figs and carob were hung to dry in the breeze off the sea.

Builders have been in this winter, updating some of the rooms in the main palazzo, creating a bar and restaurant in the main courtyard and improving the poolside bar so that it now looks out over the sea.

Life is a languid affair here. Breakfast is taken at a civilised hour at the edge of the pool and the rest of the day is given up to the garden or the private sandy beach, which is reached through a tiny door in the walls. Both lunch and dinner can be enjoyed out in the open under umbrellas on the lovely belvedere with spectacular views out to sea. At night, Capri twinkles romantically in the distance. Seafood is, naturally, a speciality. Be sure to sample the limoncello, made at the palazzo with lemons from the garden.

Naturally, this is a favourite place for weddings and for location shooting. A particularly large smile spreads across Angelo's face when he recalls the 2003 Pirelli calendar being created on his beach, in his gardens and at his favourite hideaway, Punta Licosa. His fictional counterpart would have summoned a coach and four, but Angelo climbs into his BMW and drives the few miles there when he feels the need to walk and think. It's a coastline of rocky coves and pinefringed paths; a wild, untamed place that anyone can visit, either by road or by boat.

You might take your car and head for Paestum, the spectacular ruin that lies 45 minutes north of Santa Maria di Castellabate. Three massive temples, built by the Greeks, tower over the ironingboard flatness of the surrounding marshes that lead to the sea marshes that once harboured the malaria that drove away the city's population and left it a romantic, ghostly ruin.

In conversation up in his private apartments, Angelo is proud that his family played a significant part in the preservation of Italy's more famous ruin at Pompeii. A greatgreatgreat uncle, when minister of culture, established the National Museum at Naples, which exhibits the bountiful treasures of the devasted Roman city. Other keepsakes preserve the memory of Antonio Pignatelli who, as ambassador, signed the peace treaty between Napoleon and the King of the Two Sicilies; of Pope Innocenzo XII (16911700) and of Cardinale Decano Gennaro Pignatelli di Belmonte, who was chief cardinal from 1908 to 1948.

And, here, to complete the parallel with The Leopard, can be found the palazzo's private chapel. Angelo recalls his grandfather's strict instructions that all the family and the estate workers should gather here for devotions with the family priest; prayers murmured through slanting rays of sunlight in the still afternoon heat of an Italy long past.