Arezzo

Arezzo

Arezzo

“Rarely do great beauty and great virtue dwell together.” — Francesco Petrarca.

De remediis utriusque fortunae (1354), Book II

Arezzo (Italian pronunciation: [aˈrettso]) is a city and comune in Italy and the capital of the province of the same name located in Tuscany. Arezzo is about 80 kilometres (50 miles) southeast of Florence at an elevation of 296 metres (971 ft) above sea level. It is also 30 km west of Città di Castello.

Arezzo is set on a steep hill rising from the floodplain of the River Arno. In the upper part of the town are the cathedral, the town hall and the Medici Fortress (Fortezza Medicea), from which the main streets branch off towards the lower part as far as the gates. The upper part of the town maintains its medieval appearance despite the addition of later structures. 

Amongst many notable attractions or monuments it’s worthy to mention: 

Piazza Grande. The Piazza Grande is the most noteworthy medieval square in the city, opening behind the 13th century Romanesque apse of Santa Maria della Pieve. Once the main marketplace of the city, it is currently the site of the Giostra del Saracino (“Joust of the Saracen”). It has a sloping pavement in red brick with limestone geometrical lines. 

Santa Maria della Pieve. The most striking feature of this Romanesque church is the massive, square-planned bell tower with double orders of mullioned windows. The church was built in the 12th century over a pre-existing Palaeo-Christian edifice, and was renovated a century later with the addition of the characteristic façade made of loggias with small arches surmounted by all different-styled columns. 

Roman amphitheatre and museum.

Palazzo dei Priori, erected in 1333, has been the seat of the city’s magistratures until today. The square tower is from 1337.

Medici Fortress (Fortezza Medicea), designed by Antonio da Sangallo the Younger and completed in 1538–1560. It was partly dismantled by the French in the early 19th century.

Palazzo Pretorio, which was seat of the People’s Captain until 1290. Only one of the two original towers remains.

House of Petrarch (Casa del Petrarca).

Casa Vasari (in Via XX Settembre) an older house rebuilt in 1547 by Giorgio Vasari and frescoed by him; now open as a museum, 

source: Wikipedia

All pictures and images on this site (except where explicitly stated) are ©2024 Stefano Guidetti.

Some content taken from Wikipedia (see attribution at the bottom of the post/page).
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Stefano Guidetti

Very picky IT Manager, Web Developer, Web Designer and (very) amateur photographer.
Currently employed in the educational field, working for the Italian Ministry of Education, University and Research.

(please note: social profiles are in Italian language only)

Arezzo

Bologna

Bologna

Bologna

“Surge nel chiaro inverno la fosca turrita Bologna,
e il colle sopra bianco di neve ride.
È l’ora soave che il sol morituro saluta
le torri e ’l tempio, divo Petronio, tuo”
— Giosuè Carducci, Nella Piazza di San Petronio.

Bologna is the capital and largest city of the Emilia-Romagna Region in Northern Italy. It is the seventh most populous city in Italy, at the heart of a metropolitan area of about one million people.

Of Etruscan origin, the city has been a major urban centre for centuries, first under the Etruscans, then under the Romans (Bononia), then again in the Middle Ages, as a free municipality and signoria, when it was among the largest European cities by population. Famous for its towers, churches and lengthy porticoes, Bologna has a well-preserved historical centre, thanks to a careful restoration and conservation policy which began at the end of the 1970s. Home to the oldest university in the world the University of Bologna, established in AD 1088, the city has a large student population that gives it a cosmopolitan character. In 2000 it was declared European capital of culture and in 2006, a UNESCO “City of Music” and became part of the Creative Cities Network.

No more than twenty medieval defensive towers remain out of up to 180 that were built in the 12th and 13th centuries before the arrival of unified civic government. The most famous of the towers of Bologna are the central “Due Torri” (Asinelli and Garisenda), whose iconic leaning forms provide a popular symbol of the town.

The Portico di San Luca is possibly the world’s longest. It connects Porta Saragozza (one of the twelve gates of the ancient walls built in the Middle Ages, which circled a 7.5 km (4.7 mi) part of the city) with the Sanctuary of the Madonna di San Luca, a church begun in 1723 on the site of an 11th-century edifice which had already been enlarged in the 14th century, prominently located on a hill (289 metres (948 feet)) overlooking the town, which is one of Bologna’s main landmarks. The windy 666 vault arcades, almost four kilometres (3,796 m or 12,454 ft) long, effectively links San Luca, as the church is commonly called, to the city centre.

source: Wikipedia

All pictures and images on this site (except where explicitly stated) are ©2024 Stefano Guidetti.

Some content taken from Wikipedia (see attribution at the bottom of the post/page).
Some graphics for the home page and pages header taken from Pixabay.

If you would like to reuse any of my pictures, please contact me at info@sguidetti.net

On this site we do not use profiling cookies or third parties cookies.
We do, however, use technical cookies functional to to the fruition of this site.

Privacy Policy

About me

Stefano Guidetti

Very picky IT Manager, Web Developer, Web Designer and (very) amateur photographer.
Currently employed in the educational field, working for the Italian Ministry of Education, University and Research.

(please note: social profiles are in Italian language only)

Bologna

Lucca

Lucca

Lucca

“A beutiful city completely surrounded by intact renaissance-era city walls. You can’t miss a visit.” — Anonymous author.

Lucca is a city in Tuscany, Central Italy, on the Serchio, in a fertile plain near the Tyrrhenian Sea. It is the capital of the Province of Lucca. It is famous for its intact Renaissance-era city walls.

The walls encircling the old town remain intact, even as the city expanded and modernized, unusual for cities in the region. Initially built as a defensive rampart, once the walls lost their military importance they became a pedestrian promenade, the Passeggiata delle Mura Urbane, a street atop the walls linking the bastions. It passes through the Bastions of Santa Croce, San Frediano, San Martino, San Pietro/Battisti, San Salvatore, La Libertà/Cairoli, San Regolo, San Colombano, Santa Maria, San Paolino/Catalani, and San Donato; and over the gates (Porte): San Donato, Santa Maria, San Jocopo, Elisa, San Pietro, and Sant’Anna. Each of the four principal sides of the structure is lined with a different tree species than the others.

The walled city is encircled by Piazzale Boccherini, Viale Lazzaro Papi, Viale Carlo Del Prete, Piazzale Martiri della Libertà, Via Batoni, Viale Agostino Marti, Viale G. Marconi (vide Guglielmo Marconi), Piazza Don A. Mei, Viale Pacini, Viale Giusti, Piazza Curtatone, Piazzale Ricasoli, Viale Ricasoli, Piazza Risorgimento (vide Risorgimento), and Viale Giosuè Carducci.

The town includes a number of public squares, most notably the Piazza dell’Anfiteatro, site of ancient Roman amphitheater; but also Piazzale Verdi; Piazza Napoleone’ and Piazza San Michele.

Lucca is the birthplace of composers Giacomo Puccini (La Bohème and Madama Butterfly).

Lucca hosts a number of events. The most famous are the annual Lucca Summer Festival which features live shows of international singers and music bandsand the annual Lucca Comics and Games festival, Europe’s largest festival for comics, movies, games and related subjects.

source: Wikipedia

All pictures and images on this site (except where explicitly stated) are ©2024 Stefano Guidetti.

Some content taken from Wikipedia (see attribution at the bottom of the post/page).
Some graphics for the home page and pages header taken from Pixabay.

If you would like to reuse any of my pictures, please contact me at info@sguidetti.net

On this site we do not use profiling cookies or third parties cookies.
We do, however, use technical cookies functional to to the fruition of this site.

Privacy Policy

About me

Stefano Guidetti

Very picky IT Manager, Web Developer, Web Designer and (very) amateur photographer.
Currently employed in the educational field, working for the Italian Ministry of Education, University and Research.

(please note: social profiles are in Italian language only)