Particolare del soffitto e matroneo.

A riot of colors. In 1661 he assigned the painter Carlo Rosa of Bitonto the task of painting a series of canvases that were to cover the ceiling. The artist from Bitonto worked on it from that date until 1673, ending with the two allegories on the triforium.

First (1661-1662), on the initiative and at the expense of Gaspare de Bracamonte, Count of Peñoranda, Carlo Rosa painted the canvases of the transept, assisted in the carving and gilding of the frames by the Neapolitan masters Michele Morenzio and Cesare Villani and by the Matera native Catarino Casavecchia. Paradise with the Eternal Father forms the theme of the central transept, where the various panels of the octagon depict the Madonna, the Martyrs, the Apostles, and the founders of religious orders.

Nicolaian themes (mostly taken from the writer Antonio Beatillo from Bari) are those of the left transept and the right transept. In the center of the left panel we see St. Nicholas who, passing through Bari, prophesies: Here will rest my bones. The four scenes around represent the legend of the two donkeys, the visit to Pope Sylvester, the column pushed into the Tiber, the remuneration of the farmers of Calista, near Rhodes.

In the center of the right transept, Pope Urban II goes in procession to place the relics under the central altar of the crypt. The four scenes around depict St. Nicholas placing the missing column, the consecration of the Upper Basilica in 1197, the council of 1098, the resurrection of the Portuguese pilgrim who fell from a tree.

The spectacular result encouraged the canons to continue the work in the central nave. The silver donated to the Saint during the plague of 1656 was therefore sold, and Carlo Rosa returned to work, this time assisted by Alfonso Ferenti for the decorations, by Giovanni Frisardi from Lecce for the gilding and by Francesco Scassamacchia for the carvings. The ceiling of this central nave is magnificent, recently restored by the Pouchain firm. Given its significance for the Apulian Baroque, it was not involved in the heated controversies of 1927/28 regarding the parts of the church that had to be removed because they were not in harmony with the primitive Romanesque style.