The construction of the old church goes back to the 5th century AD and was ordered by Bishop Sotero. In 1574 the Theatines (a religious order of clerics founded by San Gaetano of Thiene) acquired the building from the Caracciolo di Vico family and in 1610 the construction of the present-day Church by the Theatine architect Francesco Grimaldi began. After the death of Grimaldi, work continued under the direction of Bartolomeo Picchiatti, Gian Giacomo di Conforto, Agostino Pepe and Pietro di Marino.
This is a splendid Baroque church on a Latin cross plan with a single nave and four communicating chapels on each side. On both sides of the transept there are two altars; the white marble one on the left was designed by Francesco Borromini.
The nave is barrel-vaulted and frescoed by Giovanni Lanfranco with stories of the Martyrdoms of St Thomas, St Bartholomew, St Matthew, John the Baptist and the story of the Apostles. Where the nave and the transept cross, there is a majestic dome with stucco work and alto-rilievi by Giovan Battista d'Adamo, on designs by Dionisio Lazzari.
The arches of the eight chapels are hung with sixteen paintings by Francesco Solimena. The opposite wall is frescoed with the scene of the Pool of Bethesda, a superb composition of great freshness of colour and plasticity, this too the work of Giovanni Lanfranco.
The Monastery, which overlooks via SS.Apostoli, was built on a design by Grimaldi at the end of the 16th century. Taken by force from the Theatines and included in the property of the State in the 19th century, it was used first as a Notary's Archive, then a tobacco factory, and is now the premises of the Artistic Lyceum, a state secondary school.
There is a large cloister surrounded by the two-floor conventual building. On the first floor, a wide, sunlit gallery with a vaulted roof gives access to several parts of the convent.