Palazzo del Sedile (literally, “Palace of the Seat”), also known as Palazzo dei Nobili, (Seat of the Nobles), was once the Old Town Hall. Today, the building stands as an elegant and silent backdrop to Piazza Mercantile (Merchants’ Square), the old town’s most ancient and characteristic square. The monumental façade of this two-storey edifice looks onto this square. On the left, the building is a crowned by a clock tower housing a 1604 German-made clock that once kept the beat of the merchants’ day. A terrace tops the main building and showcases a three-arch Renaissance-style loggia, featuring a decorated ledge with allegorical female figures and busts of Roman Emperors, which were symbols of the "concordia civium" or “harmony of the citizens”. The building was erected in 1543. Its name derives from its original function; seat of the Universitas, which corresponds to a modern-day Town Council, where delegates of the Nobles and the People met. A 1604 German-manufactured clock was inserted into the Norman-style bell tower that sits adjacent to the main edifice; “shopkeepers considered the clock to be of great use as it struck every quarter of an hour (an absolute novelty in Apulia)”. Stefano Ferrara Fabbri commissioned the construction of the three-arch terrace in1722, for decorative purposes. Since its construction, the building had housed a number of administrative and cultural bodies, including the merchants’ lodge, municipal government, as well as the city's first public theatre. It had been the central office for the Council of the Nobles and First Citizens, Mayors and Mastrogiurati (a kind of Sworn Deputy Marshal responsible for public safety), the Chancellery, and the Royal Council. In other words, it acted as the heart of the city’s administrative and political life up to the 18th century.