1.
Piazza del Duomo, Milan
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Piazza del Duomo is the main piazza of Milan, Italy. It is named after, and dominated by, the Milan Cathedral, the piazza marks the center of the city, both in a geographic sense and because of its importance from an artistic, cultural, and social point of view. The origins of Piazza del Duomo can be traced back to the vision of Azzone Visconti, the piazza was named after the arengario, i. e. the seat of the local government. None of the buildings of Piazza dellArengario has survived. Azzones successor Gian Galeazzo Visconti further enlarged the piazza, ordering the demolition of the bishops house and the baptistery San Giovanni alle Fonti. In the following decades, nevertheless, the piazza did not develop much, in 1458, Pope Pius II granted Francesco Sforza and the Veneranda fabbrica del Duomo di Milano the authorization to demolish Santa Tecla to create a larger square that would fit the Duomos majesty. Somewhat preposterously, the basilica was rebuilt in the following years. In the 19th century, architect Giulio Beccaria was hired by Ferdinand I of Austria to redesign the piazza again, a major twist in the piazzas evolution came about after the Second Italian War of Independence. In 1860, the government of the city proclaimed the intention to redesign the piazza. Several architectural design competitions followed, whereby the plan of the new piazza gradually took place, the restructuring was eventually commissioned to architect Giuseppe Mengoni, and the works began in 1865. Mengonis work, in any case, was not hitchless, the company that was responsible for the works, City of Milan Improvements Company of London, eventually experienced financial problems, so that the government of Milan had to take charge. Part of the area of the Galleria was sold to private owners, when Mengoni died in 1877, only one of the arches, the one at the entrance of the Galleria, was completed, the construction of second arch was abandoned. Mengoni actually died in Piazza del Duomo, falling from a scaffolding while he was supervising the works, in 1896, the statue of King Victor Emmanuel II of Italy was inaugurated in the centre of the piazza. This marked the completion of the restructuring initiated by the city authorities in 1860, the Arengario had the main purpose of letting the local podestà make speeches to the population, it now houses a museum on 20th-century art
2.
Italy
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Italy, officially the Italian Republic, is a unitary parliamentary republic in Europe. Located in the heart of the Mediterranean Sea, Italy shares open land borders with France, Switzerland, Austria, Slovenia, San Marino, Italy covers an area of 301,338 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate and Mediterranean climate. Due to its shape, it is referred to in Italy as lo Stivale. With 61 million inhabitants, it is the fourth most populous EU member state, the Italic tribe known as the Latins formed the Roman Kingdom, which eventually became a republic that conquered and assimilated other nearby civilisations. The legacy of the Roman Empire is widespread and can be observed in the distribution of civilian law, republican governments, Christianity. The Renaissance began in Italy and spread to the rest of Europe, bringing a renewed interest in humanism, science, exploration, Italian culture flourished at this time, producing famous scholars, artists and polymaths such as Leonardo da Vinci, Galileo, Michelangelo and Machiavelli. The weakened sovereigns soon fell victim to conquest by European powers such as France, Spain and Austria. Despite being one of the victors in World War I, Italy entered a period of economic crisis and social turmoil. The subsequent participation in World War II on the Axis side ended in defeat, economic destruction. Today, Italy has the third largest economy in the Eurozone and it has a very high level of human development and is ranked sixth in the world for life expectancy. The country plays a prominent role in regional and global economic, military, cultural and diplomatic affairs, as a reflection of its cultural wealth, Italy is home to 51 World Heritage Sites, the most in the world, and is the fifth most visited country. The assumptions on the etymology of the name Italia are very numerous, according to one of the more common explanations, the term Italia, from Latin, Italia, was borrowed through Greek from the Oscan Víteliú, meaning land of young cattle. The bull was a symbol of the southern Italic tribes and was often depicted goring the Roman wolf as a defiant symbol of free Italy during the Social War. Greek historian Dionysius of Halicarnassus states this account together with the legend that Italy was named after Italus, mentioned also by Aristotle and Thucydides. The name Italia originally applied only to a part of what is now Southern Italy – according to Antiochus of Syracuse, but by his time Oenotria and Italy had become synonymous, and the name also applied to most of Lucania as well. The Greeks gradually came to apply the name Italia to a larger region, excavations throughout Italy revealed a Neanderthal presence dating back to the Palaeolithic period, some 200,000 years ago, modern Humans arrived about 40,000 years ago. Other ancient Italian peoples of undetermined language families but of possible origins include the Rhaetian people and Cammuni. Also the Phoenicians established colonies on the coasts of Sardinia and Sicily, the Roman legacy has deeply influenced the Western civilisation, shaping most of the modern world
3.
Lombardy
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Lombardy is one of the twenty administrative regions of Italy, in the northwest of the country, with an area of 23,844 square kilometres. Milan, Lombardys capital, is the second-largest city and the largest metropolitan area in Italy, the word Lombardy comes from Lombard, which in turn is derived from Late Latin Longobardus, Langobardus, derived from the Proto-Germanic elements *langaz + *bardaz, equivalent to long beard. Some sources derive the second element instead from Proto-Germanic *bardǭ, *barduz, Lombardy referred during the early Middle Ages to the entire territory of Italy ruled by the Lombards, a Germanic tribe who conquered much of the Italian peninsula beginning in the 6th century. During the late Middle Ages, the term shifted meaning and was used to identify the whole of Northern Italy, with a surface of 23,861 km2, Lombardy is the 4th largest region of Italy. It is bordered by Switzerland and by the Italian regions of Trentino-Alto Adige/Südtirol and Veneto, Emilia-Romagna, three distinct natural zones can be fairly easily distinguished in the Lombardy region, mountains, hills and plains – the latter being divided in Alta and Bassa. Inconsistent with the three distinctions above made is the subregion of Oltrepò Pavese, formed by the Apennine foothills beyond the Po River. The mighty Po river marks the border of the region for a length of about 210 km. In its progress it receives the waters of the Ticino River, the other streams which contribute to the great river are, the Olona, the Lambro, the Adda, the Oglio and the Mincio. The numerous lakes of Lombardy, all of glacial origin, lie in the northern highlands, from west to east these are Lake Maggiore, Lake Lugano, Lake Como, Lake Iseo, Lake Idro, then Lake Garda, the largest in Italy. A minor mountainous area, the Oltrepò Pavese, lies south of the Po, in the plains, intensively cultivated for centuries, little of the original environment remains. The most commons trees are elm, alder, sycamore, poplar, willow, in the area of the foothills lakes, however, grow olive trees, cypresses and larches, as well as varieties of subtropical flora such as magnolias, azaleas, acacias. Numerous species of flora in the Prealpine area include some kinds of saxifrage, the Lombard garlic, groundsels bellflowers. The highlands are characterized by the vegetation of the whole range of the Italian Alps. At a lower levels oak woods or broadleafed trees grow, on the slopes beech trees grow at the lowest limits. Shrubs such as rhododendron, dwarf pine and juniper are native to the summital zone, Lombardy has a wide array of climates, due to local variances in elevation, proximity to inland water basins, and large metropolitan areas. In addition, there is a seasonal temperature variation. A peculiarity of the climate is the thick fog that covers the plains between October and February. In the Alpine foothills, characterised by an Oceanic climate, numerous lakes exercise a mitigating influence, in the hills and mountains, the climate is humid continental
4.
Democratic Party (Italy)
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The Democratic Party is a social-democratic political party in Italy. The partys acting leader is Matteo Orfini, who replaced Matteo Renzi after his resignation in February 2017, in April–May the party will hold a leadership election and Renzi is again running for secretary. The PD was founded on 14 October 2007 upon the merger of various centre-left parties which had part of The Olive Tree list. The PDs main ideological trends are thus social democracy and the Italian Christian leftist tradition, the party has been also influenced by social liberalism, which was already present in some of the founding components of the DS and DL, and more generally by a Third Way progressivism. Following the 2013 general election and the 2014 European Parliament election, the PD was the largest party in the Chamber of Deputies, the Senate and the European Parliament. From 2013 the Italian government has been led by three successive Democratic Prime Ministers, Enrico Letta, Matteo Renzi, and Paolo Gentiloni. As of 2017, other than the government, Democrats head fourteen regional governments out of twenty and function as coalition partner in Tuscany. Former bigwigs include Giorgio Napolitano, Sergio Mattarella, Romano Prodi, Giuliano Amato, Massimo DAlema, Pier Luigi Bersani, Francesco Rutelli, the coalition, in alliance with the Communist Refoundation Party, won the 1996 general election and Prodi became Prime Minister. In February 1998 the PDS merged with minor parties to become the Democrats of the Left, while in March 2002 the PPI, RI. In the summer of 2003 Prodi suggested that the forces would participate in the 2004 European Parliament election with a common list. Whereas the Union of Democrats for Europe and the far-left parties refused, four parties accepted, the DS, DL, the Italian Democratic Socialists and the European Republicans Movement. They launched a joint list named United in the Olive Tree, the project was later abandoned in 2005 by the SDI. In the 2006 general election the list obtained 31. 3% of the vote for the Chamber of Deputies, eight parties agreed to merge into the PD, Democrats of the Left Democracy is Freedom – The Daisy. Southern Democratic Party, Sardinia Project, European Republicans Movement, Democratic Republicans, Middle Italy, while the DL agreed to the merger with virtually no resistance, the DS experienced a more heated final congress. On 19 April 2007 approximately 75% of party members voted in support of the merger of the DS into the PD, the left-wing opposition, led by Fabio Mussi, obtained just 15% of the support within the party. A third motion, presented by Gavino Angius and supportive of the PD only within the Party of European Socialists, during and following the congress, both Mussi and Angius announced their intention not to join the PD and founded a new party called Democratic Left. On 22 May 2007 the composition of the committee of the nascent party was announced. On 18 June the committee met to decide the rules for the election of the 2,400 members of the partys constituent assembly
5.
Sforza Castle
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Sforza Castle is in Milan, northern Italy. It was built in the 15th century by Francesco Sforza, Duke of Milan, later renovated and enlarged, in the 16th and 17th centuries it was one of the largest citadels in Europe. Extensively rebuilt by Luca Beltrami in 1891–1905, it now houses several of the citys museums, the original construction was ordered by local lord Galeazzo II Visconti in 1358–c. 1370, this castle was known as Castello di Porta Giova, the castle was the main residence in the city of its Visconti lords, and was destroyed by the short-lived Golden Ambrosian Republic which ousted them in 1447. In 1450, Francesco Sforza, once he shattered the republicans, in 1452 he hired sculptor and architect Filarete to design and decorate the central tower, which is still known as Torre del Filarete. After Francescos death, the construction was continued by his son Galeazzo Maria, the decoration was executed by local painters. In 1476, during the regency of Bona of Savoy, the tower with her name was built, in 1494 Ludovico Sforza became lord of Milan, and called numerous artists to decorate the castle. These include Leonardo da Vinci and Bramante, who painted frescoes in the Sala del Tesoro, around 1498, Leonardo worked at the ceiling of the Sala delle Asse, painting decorations of vegetable motifs. In the following years, however, the castle was damaged by assaults from Italian, French and German troops, after the French victory in the 1515 Battle of Marignano, the defeated Maximilian Sforza, his Swiss mercenaries, and the cardinal-bishop of Sion retreated into the castle. However, King Francis I of France followed them into Milan, in 1521, in a period in which it was used as a weapons depot, the Torre del Filarete exploded. When Francesco II Sforza returned briefly to power in Milan, he had the fortress restored and enlarged, under the Spanish domination which followed, the castle became a citadel, as the governors seat was moved to the Ducal Palace. Its garrison varied from 1,000 to 3,000 men, in 1550 works began to adapt the castle to modern fortification style, as an hexagon -shaped star fort, following the addition of 12 bastions. The external fortifications reached 3 km in length and covered an area of 25.9 hectares, the castle remained in use as a fort also after the Spaniards were replaced by the Austrians in Lombardy. Most of the fortifications were demolished during the period of Napoleonic rule in Milan under the Cisalpine Republic. The semi-circular Piazza Castello was constructed around the city side of the castle, the area on the country side of the castle was laid out as a 700-by-700-metre square parade ground known as Piazza dArmi. After the unification of Italy in the 19th century, the castle was transferred from military use to the city of Milan, parco Sempione, one of the largest parks in the city, was created on the former parade grounds. The government of Milan undertook restoration works, directed by Luca Beltrami, the Via Dante was cut through the medieval street layout in the 1880s to provide a direct promenade between the castle and the Duomo on axis with the main gate. The central tower, known as the Torre Filarete, above the city entrance was rebuilt, on the basis of 16th-century drawings
6.
Pinacoteca di Brera
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The Pinacoteca di Brera is the main public gallery for paintings in Milan, Italy. It contains one of the foremost collections of Italian paintings, an outgrowth of the program of the Brera Academy. The Palazzo Brera owes its name to the Germanic braida, indicating a grassy opening in the city structure, compare the Bra of Verona, the convent on the site passed to the Jesuits, then underwent a radical rebuilding by Francesco Maria Richini. When the Jesuits were disbanded in 1773, the remained the seat of the astronomical Observatory. In 1774 were added the herbarium of the new botanical garden, the buildings were extended to designs by Giuseppe Piermarini, who was appointed professor in the Academy when it was formally founded in 1776, with Giuseppe Parini as dean. Piermarini taught at the Academy for 20 years, while he was controller of the citys urbanistic projects, like the public gardens, the Academys artistic committee, the Commissione di Ornato exercised a controlling influence on public monuments, a precursor of todays Sopraintendenze delle Belle Arti. Thus in 1882 the Paintings Gallery was separated from the Academy, from 1891 the exhibitions were reduced to triennial events, and architectural projects developed their autonomous course. The Brera Observatory hosted the astronomer Giovanni Schiaparelli for four decades, collections of Pinacoteca di Brera Aldo Carpi Brera Gallery official website Accademia di Brera official website
Italy
Cadorna, Cairoli, Cordusio, Duomo, Palestro, Porta Venezia, San Babila;
Cadorna, Lanza, Moscova;
Crocetta, Duomo, Missori, Montenapoleone, Porta Romana, Turati.
Media related to Zone 1 of Milan at Wikimedia Commons
