Showing posts with label Explorers. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Explorers. Show all posts

9 January 2024

Marco Polo - merchant and explorer

Venetian trader who described travels in China 

A 19th century portrait in mosaic of Marco Polo at Palazzo Tursi in Genoa
A 19th century portrait in mosaic of
Marco Polo at Palazzo Tursi in Genoa
The Italian explorer Marco Polo, who achieved a place in history as the first European to write in extensive detail about life in China, is thought by many historians to have died on or close to this day in 1324 in his home city of Venice.

Accounts of his final days say he had been confined to bed with an illness and that his doctor was concerned on January 8 that he was close to death. Indeed, so worried were those around his bedside that they sent for a local priest to witness his last will and testament, which Polo dictated in the presence of his wife, Donata, and their three daughters, who were appointed executors.

The supposition has been that he died on the same evening. The will document was preserved and is kept by the Biblioteca Marciana, the historic public library of Venice just across the Piazzetta San Marco from St Mark’s Basilica. It shows the date of the witnessing of Polo’s testament as January 9, although it should be noted that under Venetian law at the time, the change of date occurred at sunset rather than midnight.

Confusingly, the document recorded his death as occurring in June 1324 and the witnessing of the will on January 9, 1323. The consensus among historians, however, is that he reached his end in January, 1324.

Born in 1254 - again the specific date is unknown - Marco Polo was best known for his travels to Asia in the company of his father, Niccolò, and his uncle, Maffeo.

Having left Venice in 1271, when Marco was 16 or 17, they are said to have reached China in 1275 and remained there for 17 years. Marco wrote about the trip in a book that was originally titled Book of the Marvels of the World but is today known as The Travels of Marco Polo. It is considered a classic of travel literature.

A map showing the journeys said to have been  made by Marco Polo on his travels to China
A map showing the journeys said to have been 
made by Marco Polo on his travels to China
The book, which was written in prison after he had been captured during a war between the rival republics of Venice and Genoa upon returning to Italy, describes his experiences in China in terms of first-hand accounts. Sceptical experts have suggested some of the stories might have been appropriated from other explorers and merchants and passed off by Polo as his own. Yet although some of his descriptions of the exotic animals he ecountered seem somewhat fantastical, the accuracy of much of what he described has generally been confirmed in subsequent years.

The book, which Polo dictated to Rustichello da Pisa, a fellow prisoner of the Genoese who happened to be a writer, introduced European audiences to the mysteries of the Eastern world, including the wealth and sheer size of the Mongol Empire and China, providing descriptions of China, Persia, India, Japan and other Asian cities and countries.

Polo’s father and uncle had traded with the Middle East for many years and had become wealthy in the process. They had visited the western territories of the Mongol Empire on a previous expedition, established strong trading links and visited Shangdu, about 200 miles (320km) north of modern Beijing, where Kublai Khan, founder of the Yuan dynasty, had an opulent summer palace, and which was immortalised by the English poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge as Xanadu.

Their journey with Marco originally took them to Acre in present-day Israel, where - at the request of Kublai Khan - they secured some holy oil from the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem. They continued to the Persian port city of Hormuz and thereafter followed overland routes that later became known as the Silk Road.

Travelling through largely rough terrain, the journey to Shangdu took the best part of three years.  Marco Polo’s long stay owed itself partly to Kublai Khan taking him into his court and sending him on various official missions.  In that capacity, he extended his travels to include what is now the city of Hangzhou and may have crossed the border into India and what is now Myanmar.

A painting of unknown origin of Marco Polo's father and uncle presenting a gift to Kublai Khan
A painting of unknown origin of Marco Polo's
father and uncle presenting a gift to Kublai Khan
The Polos left China in around 1291 or 1292, given the responsibility to escort a young princess to Persia, where she was to marry the Mongol ruler. Their route from Persia took through parts of what is now Turkey, to Constantinople, and then north along the Adriatic to Venice.  They arrived home in 1295.

It was during the second of four wars between Venice and their trading rival Genoa that Marco Polo was captured.  He remained a prisoner until 1299, when a peace treaty allowed for his release.  Thereafter, he continued his life as a merchant, achieving prosperity, but rarely left Venice or its territories again until his death.

His book, known to Italians under the title Il Milione after Polo’s own nickname, introduced the West to many aspects of Chinese culture and customs and described such things as porcelain, gunpowder, paper money and eyeglasses, which were previously unknown in Europe. Contrary to some stories, his discoveries did not include pasta, which was once held widely to have been imported by Marco Polo but is thought actually to have existed in the Italy of the Etruscans in the 4th century BC. 

Christopher Columbus and other explorers are said to have been inspired by Marco Polo to begin their own adventures, Columbus discovering the Americas effectively by accident after setting sail across the Atlantic in the expectation of reaching the eastern coast of Asia.

Marco Polo is buried at the church of San Lorenzo
Marco Polo is buried at the
church of San Lorenzo
Travel tip:

One of the wishes Marco Polo expressed on his deathbed was that he be buried in the church of San Lorenzo in the Castello sestiere of Venice, about 850m (930 yards) on foot from Piazza San Marco. The church, whick dates back to the ninth century and was rebuilt in the late 16th century, houses the relics of Saint Paul I of Constantinople as well as Marco Polo’s tomb. Castello is the largest of the six sestieri, stretching east almost from the Rialto Bridge and including the shipyards of Arsenale, once the largest naval complex in Europe, the Giardini della Biennale and the island of Sant’Elena. Unlike its neighbour, San Marco, Castello is a quiet neighbourhood, where tourists can still find deserted squares and empty green spaces.

Arched Byzantine windows thought to have been from the Polo family home
Arched Byzantine windows thought to
have been from the Polo family home
Travel tip: 

The Polo family home in Venice, which was largely destroyed in a fire in 1598, was in the Cannaregio sestiere close to where the Teatro Malibran now stands, in Corte Seconda del Milion, one of two small square that recall Marco Polo’s nickname, Il Milione, which may have been coined as a result of his enthusiasm for the wealth he encountered at the court of Kublai Khan in China or as a result of his being from the Polo Emilioni branch of the family. The Byzantine arches visible in Corte Seconda del Milion are thought to have been part of the Polo house.  The Teatro Malibran was originally inaugurated in 1678 as the Teatro San Giovanni Grisostomo, opening with the premiere of Carlo Pallavicino's opera Vespasiano.  It was renamed Teatro Malibran in 1835 in honour of a famous soprano, Maria Malibran, who was engaged to sing Vincenzo Bellini's La sonnambula there but was so shocked as the crumbling condition of the theatre that she refused her fee, insisting it be put towards the theatre’s upkeep instead. 

Also on this day:

1878: The death of Victor Emmanuel II, first King of Italy

1878: Umberto I succeeds Victor Emanuel II

1944: The birth of architect Massimiliano Fuksas

2004: The death of political philosopher Norberto Bobbio


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25 January 2022

Pierre Savorgnan de Brazza - explorer

Italian whose name is commemorated in an African capital

De Brazza was born in Castel Gandolfo, south of Rome
De Brazza was born in Castel
Gandolfo, south of Rome
The explorer Pierre Savorgnan de Brazza, from whom Brazzaville, capital of the Republic of Congo took its name, was born on this day in 1852 in Castel Gandolfo, a town 25km (16 miles) southeast of Rome.

His birth name was Pietro Paolo Savorgnan di BrazzĂ  but he became a French citizen in 1874 after obtaining sponsorship from the French government to help fund his African expeditions, and adopted a French version of his name.

Although it was because of de Brazza that much of Congo became a French colony, the transference of sovereignty took place without bloodshed and de Brazza was well liked for his friendly nature and commitment to peace. Its capital, founded in 1880, was named Brazzaville in his honour and the name was retained even after the Republic of Congo became fully independent in 1960.

De Brazza was born into a noble family, the seventh of 13 children. His father, Ascanio Savorgnan di BrazzĂ , was a sculptor and painter who had studied under Antonio Canova; his mother, Giacinta Simonetti, hailed from a Roman family with Venetian roots. The family also owned houses in what is now Friuli Venezia Giulia at Brazzacco and Soleschiano, near Manzano, in the province of Udine.

His interest in exploring took hold at a young age and he enrolled at the French naval academy at Brest. Upon graduation, he was sent to Algeria, already a French colony, and witnessed an uprising that was put down by the French occupiers only at the cost of many lives, after which he vowed to follow a path of peace.  He also became firmly against slavery.

In France, de Brazza became known as le conquérant pacifique
In France, de Brazza became known
as le conquĂ©rant pacifique 
His explorations in Africa began in 1874, when he visited Gabon on the west coast of Africa while serving on a French navy frigate and led an expedition inland along the OgoouĂ© river. On his return, he successfully lobbied the French government to support an expedition to the OgoouĂ©’s source, although much of the funding came from his own pockets, or rather his family’s.

He was away for three years, but his success in forming friendly relationships with local leaders persuaded the French to fund further expeditions, driven by a desire to make territorial gains in the area in competition notably with the Portuguese and Belgium, including one to the strategically important Congo basin.

It was there that de Brazza met King Illoh Makoko of the Bateke tribe, much of whose territory fell into the area that would become French Congo, and persuaded him to place his kingdom under the protection of the French flag. Makoko, enticed by trade possibilities, signed a treaty. He also arranged for the establishment of a French settlement at Mfoa on the Congo's Malebo Pool, the beginnings of the city that would later be called Brazzaville.

Back in France, the press hailed de Brazza as le conquérant pacifique - the peaceful conqueror - for his success in aiding French imperial expansion without the need for armed conflict.

He was made governor-general of French Congo in 1886, a popular appointment with the Bateke people, but was replaced after just over a decade in the role, largely on the basis that the territory was not generating the income for France that had been envisaged. 

The De Brazza Mausoleum in Brazzaville cost $10 million
The De Brazza Mausoleum in
Brazzaville cost $10 million
There were stories that de Brazza was too kind towards the native people, insisting on working conditions that some in France felt needed to be less comfortable if they were to generate maximum productivity. His successor, Émile Gentil, turned a blind eye to the harsh practices favoured by some holders of government concessions. In 1905, de Brazza compiled a report that exposed forced labour and brutality under Gentil’s watch, but his findings were suppressed.

Shortly afterwards, after leaving Brazzaville en route to Dakar in what is now Senegal, de Brazza died. The cause was officially listed as dysentery, but his wife, ThĂ©rèse, believed he was poisoned. 

De Brazza was given a state funeral at Sainte-Clotilde, Paris, and he was  interred at the cemetery of Père Lachaise, but ThĂ©rèse later had his body exhumed and reburied in Algiers, the capital of present-day Algeria.

A century later, the presidents of Congo, Gabon and France attended a ceremony in Brazzaville to lay the foundation stone for a memorial to de Brazza in the form of a mausoleum made from Italian marble, which would cost 10 million dollars to build. In 2006 his remains along with those of his wife and four children were exhumed in Algiers, to be reinterred in Brazzaville.

Officially, he was regarded as one of the founding fathers of the Republic of Congo but the move to erect a permanent monument was not universally popular, with some Congolese adamant that honours should never be bestowed on a coloniser, regardless of the circumstances. 

The Apostolic Palace in Castel Gandolfo was officially the pope's summer residence
The Apostolic Palace in Castel Gandolfo
was officially the pope's summer residence
Travel tip:

Castel Gandolfo, where de Brazza was born, overlooks Lake Albano from a wonderful position in the hills south of Rome. It falls within the regional park of Castelli Romani, which has many places of historic and artistic interest to visit. Castel Gandolfo was part of the Papal States until Italian unification was completed in 1870 and it’s Apostolic Palace remained the official papal summer residence even after the town became part of Lazio. Indeed, the palace is still the property of the Holy See and is policed by the Swiss Guard. 

Some ruins of the original castle still remain within the estate
Some ruins of the original castle still
remain within the estate
Travel tip:

Brazzacco, which can be found about 11km (7 miles) northeast of the city of Udine, is home to the Castello di BrazzĂ , a villa and estate that has belonged to the Savorgnan family since the 11th or 12th centuries. The estate contains the remains of a 10th century castle. The villa was commandeered for military purposes in both the First World War, when it was the headquarters for the Austrian army, under whose charge it was badly damaged by a fire in 1917, and in the Second World War, when it was occupied first by Nazi forces and then by the Allies before finally the residence of the commander of the Italian troops in the area.  Nowadays, rooms in the villa are available to visitors in the summer months, while a museum on the estate contains an exhibition of African artefacts.

Also on this day:

1348: An earthquake hits the region of Friuli Venezia Giulia

1755: The birth of physician Paolo Mascagni

1866: The birth of operatic baritone Antonio Scotti

1982: The birth of singer-songwriter Noemi


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5 November 2021

Giovanni Battista Belzoni – archaeologist

The Great Belzoni’s powerful physique helped him remove Egyptian treasures

A portrait of Giovanni Belzoni during his time as an archaeologist in Egypt
A portrait of Giovanni Belzoni during
his time as an archaeologist in Egypt
Explorer and pioneer archaeologist of Egyptian antiquities, Giovanni Battista Belzoni, was born on this day in 1778 in Padua, which was then part of the Republic of Venice.

He became famous for his height and strength and his discovery and removal to England of the seven-ton bust of Ramesses II.

Belzoni was born into a poor family. At the age of 16 he went to find work in Rome and studied hydraulics. He was planning to take monastic vows but in 1798 French troops occupied the city and he moved to the Batavian Republic, now the Netherlands, where he earned his living as a barber.

He moved to England in 1803, allegedly to escape going to prison. He was six feet seven inches tall and had a powerful physique. For a while he earned his living as a circus strongman under the name, The Great Belzoni.

He also exhibited his models of hydraulic engines and went to Cairo in 1815 to offer hydraulic engines for use in irrigation to Muhammad Ali Pasha, the founder of modern Egypt.

But two years later he embarked on another new career, excavating Egyptian tombs and temples for their treasures. It was said he damaged other less valuable objects in the process, which was later frowned upon.

The 6ft 7ins Belzoni pictured as a circus strongman in England
The 6ft 7ins Belzoni pictured
as a circus strongman in England
At Thebes he obtained the colossal sculpture of the head of Ramesses II for the British Museum. It took him 17 days and he had to use 130 men to help him tow it to the river where it was loaded on to a boat bound for England. In the nearby Valley of the Tombs of Kings, he discovered the tomb of Seti I and removed the aragonite sarcophagus for the Sir John Soane Museum in London. This became known as Belzoni’s Tomb.

While he was in the process of removing an obelisk from the Nile island of Philae, it was taken from him at gunpoint by men working for the French.

He explored an island in the Nile, known as Elephantine, and the temple of Edfu. He also cleared the entrance to the great temple of Ramesses II at Abu Simbel. He was the first to penetrate the pyramid of Khafre at Giza and he identified the ruins of the city of Berenice on the Red Sea.

Belzoni returned to England in 1819 and published an account of his adventure – Narratives of the Operations and Recent Discoveries Within the Pyramids, Temples, Tombs and Excavations in Egypt and Nubia. It was a two-volume work published in 1820.

The explorer and archaeologist died in 1823 at the age of 45 in Gwato, now called Ughoton, in Nigeria on his way to Timbuktu. In 1825 Belzoni’s widow exhibited his drawings and models of the Royal tombs of Thebes in London and Paris.

The Scrovegni Chapel is one of the many attractions of the city of Padua
The Scrovegni Chapel is one of the many
attractions of the city of Padua
Travel tip:

Padua in the Veneto is one of the most important centres for art in Italy and home to the country’s second oldest university. Padua has become acknowledged as the birthplace of modern art because of the Scrovegni Chapel, the inside of which is covered with frescoes by Giotto, an artistic genius who was the first to paint people with realistic facial expressions showing emotion. His scenes depicting the lives of Mary and Joseph, painted between 1303 and 1305, are considered his greatest achievement and one of the world’s most important works of art. At Palazzo Bo, where Padua’s university was founded in 1222, you can still see the original lectern used by Galileo and the world’s first anatomy theatre, where dissections were secretly carried out from 1594.

The Prato della Valle square in Padua was built on the site of a Roman theatre
The Prato della Valle square in Padua was
built on the site of a Roman theatre
Travel tip:

The elliptical Prato della Valle, one of Padua's principal squares, is built on the site of the Zairo theatre on land which fell into disuse and became flooded following the fall of the Roman Empire.  The land was drained in the 18th century and a canal crossed by four bridges was created around an island planted with trees and lawns, which was later lined by statues of 78 eminent citizens of Padua. Nearby is a restaurant, the Ristorante Zairo, which contains statues and wall decorations that recall the chariot races and other activities that would have taken place in the theatre. Diners can also see a 17th century fresco that came to light when renovations uncovered part of the structure of a former church.

Also on this day:

1666: The birth of composer Attilio Ariosti

1702: The birth of painter Pietro Longhi

1754: The birth explorer Alessandro Malaspina

1777: The birth of dancer Filippo Taglioni

1898: The birth of Francesco Domenico Chiarello, who would become one of the longest surviving victims of both world wars


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9 March 2018

Amerigo Vespucci – explorer

Medici clerk who discovered a new world


Amerigo Vespucci began exploring as an observer at the invitation of the King of Portugal
Amerigo Vespucci began exploring as an observer
at the invitation of the King of Portugal 
Explorer and cartographer Amerigo Vespucci was born on this day in 1454 in Florence.

Vespucci was the first to discover the ‘new world’, which later came to be called the Americas, taking the Latin version of his first name.

He was the son of a notary in Florence and a cousin of the husband of the beautiful artist’s model, Simonetta Vespucci. He was educated by his uncle, Fra Giorgio Antonio Vespucci, a Dominican friar, and he was later hired as a clerk by the Medici family.

He acquired the favour of Lorenzo di Pierfrancesco de' Medici, who sent him to the Medici office in Cadiz in Spain to investigate the managers, who were under suspicion.

Later, as the executor of an Italian merchant who had died in Seville, Vespucci fulfilled the deceased’s contract with Castile to provide 12 vessels to sail to the Indies. He then continued supplying provisions for expeditions to the Indies and was invited by the King of Portugal to participate as an observer on several voyages of exploration.

Although letters have been forged and fraudulent claims have been made about his discoveries, Vespucci is known to have taken an active part in at least two real voyages of exploration.

Vespucci's arrival in the 'new world', as imagined by the  Flemish engraver Theodor de Bry
Vespucci's arrival in the 'new world', as imagined by the
Flemish engraver Theodor de Bry 
In 1499, on a voyage intended to round the southern end of the African mainland into the Indian ocean, Vespucci is believed to have crossed the Atlantic, hitting land in what is now Guyana on the South American mainland, then sailed southwards, discovering the mouth of the Amazon river and seeing Trinidad and the Orinoco river, before returning to Spain.

In 1501, he was on a voyage which reached the coast of Brazil and sailed along the coast of South America to Rio di Janeiro’s bay. He wrote in a letter to Lorenzo di Pierfrancesco de' Medici that the land masses were ‘larger and different from the Asia described by Marco Polo and, therefore, must be a new world, a previously unknown fourth continent.’

In 1507, an author of a geography book, Martin WaldseemĂĽller, suggested the name America, especially for the Brazilian part of the new world, in honour of the ‘illustrious man’ who discovered it. This is how the names for North America and South America originated.

Vespucci was made chief navigator of Spain in 1508 by King Ferdinand and was commissioned to start a school of navigation, where he developed a rudimentary method of determining longitude. He died in 1512 at his home in Seville, aged 57.

The church of San Salvatore di Ognissanti is the parish church of the Vespucci family
The church of San Salvatore di Ognissanti
is the parish church of the Vespucci family
Travel tip:

The parish church of the Vespucci family is the Church of All Saints - Chiesa di San Salvatore di Ognissanti - in Borgo Ognissanti, close to the Santa Maria Novella railway station. In the Vespucci Chapel, a fresco by Domenico Ghirlandaio depicts the Madonna della Misericordia protecting members of the Vespucci family. It is believed to show Amerigo Vespucci as a child among them. Vespucci later named a bay in Brazil, San Salvatore di Ognissanti, which is the origin of the name of the city of Salvador in Brazil.

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The statue of Amerigo Vespucci by the Ufizzi
The statue of Amerigo
Vespucci by the Ufizzi 
Travel tip:

The Uffizi Gallery in Florence has a posthumous portrait of Amerigo Vespucci, which has been attributed to Cristofano dell’Altissimo. Outside the gallery there is also a statue of Amerigo Vespucci. The Uffizi is one of the most important art galleries in the world and attracts so many visitors it is vital to book a ticket in advance to avoid a long wait. The complex of buildings that make up the gallery was designed by Giorgio Vasari as offices - uffizi - for the Medici family in 1560.


5 November 2017

Alessandro Malaspina - explorer

Mapped Pacific on four-year epic journey


Alessandro Malaspina spent much of his life in the employ of the Spanish navy
Alessandro Malaspina spent much of his
life in the employ of the Spanish navy
Alessandro Malaspina, an explorer not so well known as his compatriots, Amerigo Vespucci and Christopher Colombus, but whose contribution to mankind’s knowledge of the globe was no less important, was born on this day in 1754 in Mulazzo, a village now in the province of Massa-Carrara, about 120km (75 miles) northwest of Florence.

Like Vespucci and Columbus, Malaspina sailed under the flag of Spain, whose king, Charles III, was an enthusiastic supporter of scientific research and exploration.

He spent much of his life as an officer in the Spanish navy, and it was after completing an 18-month circumnavigation of the world on behalf of the Royal Philippines Company between September 1786 and May 1788 that he proposed to the Spanish government that he make an expedition to the Pacific similar to those undertaken by the British explorer James Cook and the Frenchman Comte de la Pèrouse.

His proposal was accepted in part after word reached Spain that a Russian expedition was being prepared with the objective of claiming territory on the northwest coast of North America that had already been claimed by Spain.

After two years of preparation, the Malaspina Expedition, made up of two frigates - one named Descubierta in honour of Cook's Discovery - that he had built specially for the expedition, set sail from Cadiz on July 30, 1789, bound for South America. They rounded Cape Horn and sailed up the Pacific coast to Mexico.

The route followed by Malaspina's party
The route followed by Malaspina's party
At this point, Malaspina received word that King Charles IV, who had inherited the throne following the death of Charles III in 1788, wanted him to detour to Alaska and survey the coastline to find out whether a rumoured northwest passage from the Pacific coast to the Atlantic existed.

Malaspina’s vessels anchored off Alaska for a month, studying local tribespeople and collecting and recording numerous plants. Today, a glacier between Yakutat Bay and Icy Bay is known as the Malaspina Glacier.

Malaspina knew that Cook had surveyed the west coast of Prince William Sound about 15 years earlier had not found a northwest passage. He was not convinced it did exist and, rather than spend more time looking after failing to find evidence of it, the Italian set sail for the Spanish outpost at Nootka Sound on Vancouver Island, established two years earlier.

His men surveyed and mapped the area around Nootka Sound more accurately than had previously been achieved, and made more botanical studies. He moved south again to explore the mouth of the Columbia River, near where Seattle is now.

Malaspina's two frigates, drawn by Fernando Brambilla, one of a number of artists who accompanied the expedition
Malaspina's two frigates, drawn by Fernando Brambilla, one
of a number of artists who accompanied the expedition
Eventually, he headed back along the coast to Acapulco in Mexico, before crossing the ocean to explore the Philippines, New Zealand and Australia, before returning to Spain, arriving in arriving in Cadiz in September 1793, to be greeted with great acclaim.

Malaspina was elevated to fleet-brigadier in the Spanish navy but his status as a national hero collapsed, however, over the next few years as the political climate in Spain changed following the French Revolution. He became involved with a plot to overthrow the prime minister and was arrested.

He was stripped of his rank and sentenced to life imprisonment. He was released after eight years when Napoleon Bonaparte, who had taken control of the territory around his home town in Italy, intervened on his behalf. But the years in jail, often in solitary confinement, had destroyed his health.

Malaspina’s documentation from the expedition was taken from him during his incarceration and his proposed seven-volume account of the journey was left unpublished.

He returned to Italy, settling in Pontremoli in the area of northern Tuscany at that time known as the Kingdom of Etruria, where he died in 1810 at the age of 55.  Although some of his journals had by then been published, it was not until 1987 – 177 years after his death - that the first volume of his full account was published by the Spanish Naval Museum.

The last of the seven was published in 1999 and the full extent of Malaspina’s achievement could finally be appreciated, so that he could take his place alongside Columbus and Vespucci as one of history’s great explorers.

Mulazzo has a monument to the poet Dante Alighieri
Mulazzo has a monument to the poet Dante Alighieri
Travel tip:

Mulazzo is a village in the part of northwestern Tuscany known as Lunigiana, an area of great beauty that was a favourite of the poet Dante Alighieri.  Although he would often retreat to the Monastery of Santa Croce Corvo on the coast near Marina di Carrara, he also enjoyed the peace and solitude of the mountain regions inland and visited Mulazzo, which stages a Dante celebration every year.  Mulazzo also has a study centre dedicated to the career of Alessandro Malaspina.

Pontremoli sits alongside the Magra river
Pontremoli sits alongside the Magra river
Travel tip:

Pontremoli has the status of city even though its population is fewer than 8,000.  Built on the site of a settlement first noted in 1,000 BC, its position and fertile landscape in the Magra valley made it a strategically important location and consequently it changed hands many times, owned by a succession of powerful families until 1508, when it became part of an area controlled by the French.  Subsequently it was taken over by the Holy Roman Empire, the Spanish, the Republic of Genoa, the Medici Grand Duchy of Tuscany and the French again before becoming part of the unified Italy.  Malaspina had a palace there.