Tour of Pavia

Pavia was built as a result of first settlements by populations coming from Trans-Gaulian Gaul, perhaps the Levi, Marici or Insubri. The city of Pavia was founded by the Romans, to whom we owe the plan of the city remained intact to this day. Two orthogonal road directives constituted the fundamental trace of the chessboard scheme that designed the city’s structure: the maximum hinge, corresponding to Strada Nuova and the maximum decumanus, corresponding to Corso Cavour. The ancient name of Pavia was “Ticinum”. Sacked several times by the barbarians, it was conquered by the Lombards in 572 and made capital of their kingdom, with the name of Papia, hence the modern name. The Lombard domination lasted for two hundred years, until 774, when Pavia was conquered by Charlemagne. In the Church of San Michele Maggiore in Pavia were crowned King of Italy Berengario del Friuli and his successors up to Berengario II and Adalberto II. The symbolic places of Pavia are the Ponte Vecchio, San Michele Maggiore and the evocative courtyards of the University. During the wars between the German emperor Federico Barbarossa and the municipalities of the Lega Lombarda, Pavia was loyal to the imperial army, and then gradually lost importance from the political point of view. It was finally annexed from 1360 to the Duchy of Milan, under the dominion of the Visconti family. In the sixteenth century the battle of Pavia is very famous, fought on February 24, 1525 between the French and the Imperials who won because the Forlì fortune captain Cesare Hercolani, wounding the horse of King Francis I of France, allowed the capture, deserving the nickname winner of Pavia and the gratitude of Emperor Charles V of Habsburg. Related to this story is the story of the Zuppa alla Pavia, simple soup with dry bread, eggs, cheese and butter cooked by a peasant to the king just took prisoner. It is said that the king liked it so much that it was included in the court menu with the name of “soupe à la pavoise”. From the beginning of the eighteenth century until the mid-nineteenth century Pavia was under the foreign, alternate domination of Spaniards, French and Austrians. In 1859 it became part of the Kingdom of Sardinia (future Kingdom of Italy) along with the rest of Lombardy.

Pavia, an important center on the river Ticino and not far from the confluence of the latter in the Po, was an important Roman city with the name of Ticinum. The historic center is rich in monuments and places of interest, starting from the sumptuous palaces of the Lords of the city, such as Palazzo Malaspina, the Reggia di Re Alboino and Palazzo Bottigella. Among the religious monuments stand out the Cathedral of Pavia, a large building with a Greek cross plan, and the medieval church of San Pietro in Ciel d’Oro. A few steps from the center stands the Visconti Castle with its grandiose hunting grounds which extends up to the Certosa di Pavia, a magnificent historical monumental complex with a splendid façade with the Lombard school architecture, to whose realization collaborated the likes of Cristoforo Mantegazza and Giovanni Antonio Amadeo.