Top tourist attractions in Italy
Here is a list of top tourist attractions in Italy. Only the topmost tourist destinations are presented here. To see other destinations, please check the images from Italy section.
Curious if any of these place from Italy made it our best tourist attractions in the world list? Read the aformentioned article in order to find out.
You can also view all tourist attractions in Italy and other countries on our tourist attractions map.
Colosseum
Roman Structure
The Colosseum or Coliseum, also known as the Flavian Amphitheatre is an elliptical amphitheatre in the centre of the city of Rome, Italy. Built of concrete and stone, it was the largest amphitheatre of the Roman Empire, and is considered one of the greatest works of Roman architecture and engineering. It is the largest amphitheatre in the world. The Colosseum is situated just east of the Roman Forum. Construction began under the emperor Vespasian in 70 AD, and was completed in 80 AD under his successor and heir Titus. Further modifications were made during the reign of Domitian. These three emperors are known as the Flavian dynasty, and the amphitheatre was named in Latin for its association with their family name. The Colosseum could hold, it is estimated, between 50,000 and 80,000 spectators, and was used for gladiatorial contests and public spectacles such as mock sea battles, animal hunts, executions, re-enactments of famous battles, and dramas based on Classical mythology. The building ceased to be used for entertainment in the early medieval era. It was later reused for such purposes as housing, workshops, quarters for a religious order, a fortress, a quarry, and a Christian shrine.
Teatro alla Scala
Opera House
La Scala is a world-renowned opera house in Milan, Italy. The theatre was inaugurated on 3 August 1778 and was originally known as the New Royal-Ducal Theatre alla Scala. The premiere performance was Antonio Salieri's Europa riconosciuta. Most of Italy's greatest operatic artists, and many of the finest singers from around the world, have appeared at La Scala during the past 200 years. Today, the theatre is still recognised as one of the leading opera and ballet theatres in the world and is home to the La Scala Theatre Chorus, La Scala Theatre Ballet and La Scala Theatre Orchestra. The theatre also has an associate school, known as the La Scala Theatre Academy, which offers professional training in music, dance, stage craft and stage management.
Lake Garda
Lake
Lake Garda is the largest lake in Italy. It is a popular holiday location and is located in Northern Italy, about half-way between Brescia and Verona, and between Venice and Milan. Glaciers formed this alpine region at the end of the last Ice Age. The lake and its shoreline are divided between the provinces of Verona, Brescia, and Trentino.
Mount Vesuvius
Volcano
Mount Vesuvius is a stratovolcano in the Gulf of Naples, Italy, about 9 kilometres east of Naples and a short distance from the shore. It is one of several volcanoes which form the Campanian volcanic arc. Vesuvius consists of a large cone partially encircled by the steep rim of a summit caldera caused by the collapse of an earlier and originally much higher structure. Mount Vesuvius is best known for its eruption in AD 79 that led to the burying and destruction of the Roman cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum. That eruption ejected a cloud of stones, ash and fumes to a height of 20.5 miles, spewing molten rock and pulverized pumice at the rate of 1.5 million tons per second, ultimately releasing a hundred thousand times the thermal energy released by the Hiroshima bombing. An estimated 16,000 people died due to hydrothermal pyroclastic flows. The only surviving eyewitness account of the event consists of two letters by Pliny the Younger to the historian Tacitus. Vesuvius has erupted many times since and is the only volcano on the European mainland to have erupted within the last hundred years. Today, it is regarded as one of the most dangerous volcanoes in the world because of the population of 3,000,000 people living nearby and its tendency towards explosive eruptions. It is the most densely populated volcanic region in the world.
Pantheon
Roman Structure
The Pantheon is a building in Rome, Italy, commissioned by Marcus Agrippa during the reign of Augustus as a temple to all the gods of ancient Rome, and rebuilt by the emperor Hadrian about 126 AD. The building is circular with a portico of large granite Corinthian columns under a pediment. A rectangular vestibule links the porch to the rotunda, which is under a coffered concrete dome, with a central opening to the sky. Almost two thousand years after it was built, the Pantheon's dome is still the world's largest unreinforced concrete dome. The height to the oculus and the diameter of the interior circle are the same, 43.3 metres. It is one of the best-preserved of all Roman buildings. It has been in continuous use throughout its history, and since the 7th century, the Pantheon has been used as a Roman Catholic church dedicated to "St. Mary and the Martyrs" but informally known as "Santa Maria Rotonda." The square in front of the Pantheon is called Piazza della Rotonda.
Uffizi Gallery
Art Gallery
The Uffizi Gallery is a museum in Florence, Italy. It is one of the oldest and most famous art museums of the Western world.
Lake Como
Lake
Lake Como is a lake of glacial origin in Lombardy, Italy. It has an area of 146 square kilometres, making it the third largest lake in Italy, after Lake Garda and Lake Maggiore. At over 400 metres deep, it is one of the deepest lakes in Europe, and the bottom of the lake is more than 200 metres below sea-level. Lake Como has been a popular retreat for aristocrats and wealthy people since Roman times, and a very popular tourist attraction with many artistic and cultural gems. It has many villas and palaces. Many famous people have or have had homes on the shores of Lake Como, such as Matthew Bellamy, Madonna, George Clooney, Gianni Versace, Ronaldinho, Sylvester Stallone, Richard Branson, Ben Spies, and Pierina Legnani. Lake Como is widely regarded as one of the most beautiful lakes in Europe.
Leaning Tower of Pisa
Romanesque Structure
The Leaning Tower of Pisa or simply the Tower of Pisa is the campanile, or freestanding bell tower, of the cathedral of the Italian city of Pisa, known worldwide for its unintended tilt to one side. It is situated behind the Cathedral and is the third oldest structure in Pisa's Cathedral Square after the Cathedral and the Baptistry. The tower's tilt began during construction, caused by an inadequate foundation on ground too soft on one side to properly support the structure's weight. The tilt increased in the decades before the structure was completed, and gradually increased until the structure was stabilized by efforts in the late 20th and early 21st centuries. The height of the tower is 55.86 metres from the ground on the low side and 56.67 metres on the high side. The width of the walls at the base is 2.44 m. Its weight is estimated at 14,500 metric tons. The tower has 296 or 294 steps; the seventh floor has two fewer steps on the north-facing staircase. Prior to restoration work performed between 1990 and 2001, the tower leaned at an angle of 5.5 degrees, but the tower now leans at about 3.99 degrees. This means that the top of the tower is displaced horizontally 3.9 metres from where it would be if the structure were perfectly vertical.
Roman Forum
Tourist attraction
The Roman Forum is a rectangular forum surrounded by the ruins of several important ancient government buildings at the center of the city of Rome. Citizens of the ancient city referred to this space, originally a marketplace, as the Forum Magnum, or simply the Forum. It was for centuries the center of Roman public life: the site of triumphal processions and elections; the venue for public speeches, criminal trials, and gladiatorial matches; and the nucleus of commercial affairs. Here statues and monuments commemorated the city's great men. The teeming heart of ancient Rome, it has been called the most celebrated meeting place in the world, and in all history. Located in the small valley between the Palatine and Capitoline Hills, the Forum today is a sprawling ruin of architectural fragments and intermittent archeological excavations attracting numerous sightseers. Many of the oldest and most important structures of the ancient city were located on or near the Forum. The Roman kingdom's earliest shrines and temples were located on the southeastern edge. These included the ancient former royal residence, the Regia, and the Temple of Vesta, as well as the surrounding complex of the Vestal Virgins, all of which were rebuilt after the rise of imperial Rome.
Mount Etna
Volcano
Mount Etna is an active stratovolcano on the east coast of Sicily, Italy, close to Messina and Catania. It lies above the convergent plate margin between the African Plate and the Eurasian Plate. It is the tallest active volcano on the European continent, currently 3,329 m high, though this varies with summit eruptions. It is the highest mountain in Italy south of the Alps. Etna covers an area of 1,190 km² with a basal circumference of 140 km. This makes it by far the largest of the three active volcanoes in Italy, being about two and a half times the height of the next largest, Mount Vesuvius. Only Mount Teide in Tenerife surpasses it in the whole of the European–North-African region. In Greek Mythology, the deadly monster Typhon was trapped under this mountain by Zeus, the god of the sky and thunder and king of gods, and the forges of Hephaestus were said to also be located underneath it. Mount Etna is one of the most active volcanoes in the world and is in an almost constant state of activity. The fertile volcanic soils support extensive agriculture, with vineyards and orchards spread across the lower slopes of the mountain and the broad Plain of Catania to the south. Due to its history of recent activity and nearby population, Mount Etna has been designated a Decade Volcano by the United Nations. In June 2013, it was added to the list of UNESCO World Heritage Sites.
Florence Cathedral
Italian Gothic Structure
The Basilica di Santa Maria del Fiore is the main church of Florence, Italy. Il Duomo di Firenze, as it is ordinarily called, was begun in 1296 in the Gothic style to the design of Arnolfo di Cambio and completed structurally in 1436 with the dome engineered by Filippo Brunelleschi. The exterior of the basilica is faced with polychrome marble panels in various shades of green and pink bordered by white and has an elaborate 19th-century Gothic Revival façade by Emilio De Fabris. The cathedral complex, located in Piazza del Duomo, includes the Baptistery and Giotto's Campanile. The three buildings are part of the UNESCO World Heritage Site covering the historic centre of Florence and are a major attraction to tourists visiting the region of Tuscany. The basilica is one of Italy's largest churches, and until development of new structural materials in the modern era, the dome was the largest in the world. It remains the largest brick dome ever constructed. The cathedral is the mother church of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Florence, whose archbishop is currently Giuseppe Betori.
Basilica di Santa Maria Maggiore
Baroque Structure
The Basilica di Santa Maria Maggiore, or church of Santa Maria Maggiore, is the largest Catholic Marian church in Rome, Italy. Other churches in Rome dedicated to Mary include Santa Maria in Trastevere, Santa Maria in Aracoeli, and Santa Maria sopra Minerva, but the greater size of the Basilica of Saint Mary Major justifies the adjective by which it is distinguished from the other 25. According to the 1929 Lateran Treaty, the basilica located in Italian territory is owned by the Holy See and enjoys extraterritorial status similar to that of foreign embassies. The building is patrolled internally by police agents of Vatican City State, not by Italian police. It is located on Piazza del Esquilino, number 34, some five blocks southwest of the Stazione Termini.
Palazzo Pitti
Renaissance Structure
The Palazzo Pitti, in English sometimes called the Pitti Palace, is a vast mainly Renaissance palace in Florence, Italy. It is situated on the south side of the River Arno, a short distance from the Ponte Vecchio. The core of the present palazzo dates from 1458 and was originally the town residence of Luca Pitti, an ambitious Florentine banker. The palace was bought by the Medici family in 1549 and became the chief residence of the ruling families of the Grand Duchy of Tuscany. It grew as a great treasure house as later generations amassed paintings, plates, jewelry and luxurious possessions. In the late 18th century, the palazzo was used as a power base by Napoleon, and later served for a brief period as the principal royal palace of the newly united Italy. The palace and its contents were donated to the Italian people by King Victor Emmanuel III in 1919, and its doors were opened to the public as one of Florence's largest art galleries. Today, it houses several minor collections in addition to those of the Medici family, and is fully open to the public.
Archbasilica of St. John Lateran
Baroque Structure
The Papal Archbasilica of St. John Lateran, commonly known as St. John Lateran's Archbasilica, St. John Lateran's Basilica, and just The Lateran Basilica, is the cathedral church of the Diocese of Rome and the official ecclesiastical seat of the Bishop of Rome, who is the Pope. It is the oldest and ranks first among the four Papal Basilicas or major basilicas of Rome. It claims the title of ecumenical mother church among Roman Catholics. The current archpriest is Agostino Vallini, Cardinal Vicar General for the Diocese of Rome. The President of the French Republic, currently François Hollande, is ex officio the "first and only honorary canon" of the basilica, a title held by the heads of the French state since King Henry IV of France. An inscription on the façade, Christo Salvatori, indicates the church's dedication to "Christ the Saviour", for the cathedrals of all patriarchs are dedicated to Christ himself. As the cathedral of the Bishop of Rome, it ranks above all other churches in the Catholic Church, including St. Peter's Basilica. For that reason, unlike all other Roman Basilicas, it holds the title of Archbasilica.
Amalfi Coast
World Heritage Site
The Amalfi Coast is a stretch of coastline on the southern coast of the Sorrentine Peninsula in the Province of Salerno in Southern Italy. The Amalfi Coast is a popular tourist destination for the region and Italy as a whole, attracting thousands of tourists annually. During the 10th–11th centuries, the Duchy of Amalfi existed on the territory of the Amalfi Coast, centered in the town of Amalfi. The Amalfi coast was later controlled by the Principality of Salerno, until Amalfi was sacked by the Republic of Pisa in 1137. Since then the Amalfi coast has experienced a crisis. But after the unification of Italy the Amalfi coast has enjoyed a huge economic revival, prompted even by the international tourism. In 1997, the Amalfi Coast was listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site as a cultural landscape.
Milan Cathedral
Italian Gothic Structure
Milan Cathedral is the cathedral church of Milan, Italy. Dedicated to Santa Maria Nascente, it is the seat of the Archbishop of Milan, currently Cardinal Angelo Scola. The Gothic cathedral took nearly six centuries to complete. It is the fifth largest cathedral in the world and the largest in the Italian state territory.
Palazzo Vecchio
Renaissance Structure
The Palazzo Vecchio is the town hall of Florence, Italy. This massive, Romanesque, crenellated fortress-palace is among the most impressive town halls of Tuscany. Overlooking the Piazza della Signoria with its copy of Michelangelo's David statue as well as the gallery of statues in the adjacent Loggia dei Lanzi, it is one of the most significant public places in Italy. Originally called the Palazzo della Signoria, after the Signoria of Florence, the ruling body of the Republic of Florence, it was also given several other names: Palazzo del Popolo, Palazzo dei Priori, and Palazzo Ducale, in accordance with the varying use of the palace during its long history. The building acquired its current name when the Medici duke's residence was moved across the Arno to the Palazzo Pitti.
Trevi Fountain
Baroque Structure
Trevi Fountain is a fountain in the Trevi district in Rome, Italy, designed by Italian architect Nicola Salvi and completed by Pietro Bracci. Standing 26.3 metres high and 49.15 metres wide, it is the largest Baroque fountain in the city and one of the most famous fountains in the world. The fountain has appeared in several notable films, including Federico Fellini's La Dolce Vita and is a popular tourist attraction.
Arena di Verona
Roman Structure
The Verona Arena is a Roman amphitheatre in Piazza Bra in Verona, Italy, which is internationally famous for the large-scale opera performances given there. It is one of the best preserved ancient structures of its kind.
Capitoline Hill
Tourist attraction
The Capitoline Hill, between the Forum and the Campus Martius, is one of the seven hills of Rome. It was the citadel of the earliest Romans. By the 16th century, Capitolinus had become Capitolino in Italian, with the alternative Campidoglio stemming from Capitolium, one of the three major spurs of the Capitolinus. The English word capitol derives from Capitoline. The Capitoline contains few ancient ground-level ruins, as they are almost entirely covered up by Medieval and Renaissance palaces that surround a piazza, a significant urban plan designed by Michelangelo.
Gardaland
Amusement Park
Gardaland is the eighth-most-popular theme park in Europe and is between Peschiera and Lazise, at Lake Garda in Italy. Built on the eastern shore of Lake Garda at Castelnuovo del Garda, the park opened on July 19, 1975. It has expanded steadily in both size and attendance, topping 1 million visitors annually for the first time in 1984. By 2007, attendance reached 3 million. Run and operated by the Merlin Entertainments Group, the park is promoted as first in Italy. This statistic is believable as the different attractions are considerably spaced throughout the park. It currently is home to six roller coasters and a total of 32 rides. The coasters are called Blue Tornado, Magic Mountain, Sequoia Adventure, Raptor, Orto Bruco, Mammut. Fuga da Atlantide is a Shoot the Chute.
Appian Way
Tourist attraction
The Appian Way was one of the earliest and strategically most important Roman roads of the ancient republic. It connected Rome to Brindisi, Apulia, in southeast Italy. Its importance is indicated by its common name, recorded by Statius: The road is named after Appius Claudius Caecus, the Roman censor who began and completed the first section as a military road to the south in 312 BC during the Samnite Wars.
Teatro La Fenice
Opera House
Teatro La Fenice is an opera house in Venice, Italy. It is one of the most famous theatres in Europe, the site of many famous operatic premieres. Its name reflects its role in permitting an opera company to "rise from the ashes" despite losing the use of two theatres. Since opening and being named La Fenice, it has burned and been rebuilt twice more.
Circus Maximus
Roman Structure
The Circus Maximus is an ancient Roman chariot racing stadium and mass entertainment venue located in Rome, Italy. Situated in the valley between the Aventine and Palatine hills, it was the first and largest stadium in ancient Rome and its later Empire. It measured 621 m in length and 118 m in width, and could accommodate about 150,000 spectators. In its fully developed form, it became the model for circuses throughout the Roman Empire. The site is now a public park.
Vatican Library
Tourist attraction
The Vatican Apostolic Library, more commonly called simply the Vatican Library, is the library of the Holy See, currently located in Vatican City. It is one of the oldest libraries in the world and contains one of the most significant collections of historical texts. Formally established in 1475, though in fact much older, it has 75,000 codices from throughout history. From July 2007, the library had been temporarily closed to the public for rebuilding, and reopened in September 2010.
Teatro di San Carlo, Naples
Opera House
The Real Teatro di San Carlo is an opera house in Naples, Italy. It is located adjacent to the central Piazza del Plebiscito, and connected to the Royal Palace. It is the oldest continuously active venue for public opera in Europe, opening decades before both the Milanese La Scala and Venetian La Fenice theaters.
Ponte Vecchio
Tourist attraction
The Ponte Vecchio is a Medieval stone closed-spandrel segmental arch bridge over the Arno River, in Florence, Italy, noted for still having shops built along it, as was once common. Butchers initially occupied the shops; the present tenants are jewellers, art dealers and souvenir sellers. The Ponte Vecchio's two neighbouring bridges are the Ponte Santa Trinita and the Ponte alle Grazie.
Piazza San Marco
Tourist attraction
Piazza San Marco, is the principal public square of Venice, Italy, where it is generally known just as "the Piazza". All other urban spaces in the city are called "campi". The Piazzetta is an extension of the Piazza towards the lagoon in its south east corner. The two spaces together form the social, religious and political centre of Venice and are commonly considered together. This article relates to both of them. A remark usually attributed to Napoleon calls the Piazza San Marco "the drawing room of Europe".
Quirinal Palace
Palace
The Quirinal Palace is an historic building in Rome, Italy, the current official residence of the President of the Italian Republic. It is located on the Quirinal Hill, the highest of the seven hills of Rome. It has housed thirty popes, four kings and eleven presidents of the Italian Republic. The palace extends for an area of 110,500 square metres and is the 6th largest palace in the world in terms of area, as well as the largest residence of a Head of State.
Galleria Borghese
Art Gallery
The Borghese Gallery is an art gallery in Rome, Italy, housed in the former Villa Borghese Pinciana. It is a building that was from the first integral with its gardens, nowadays considered quite separately by tourists as the Villa Borghese gardens. The Galleria Borghese houses a substantial part of the Borghese collection of paintings, sculpture and antiquities, begun by Cardinal Scipione Borghese, the nephew of Pope Paul V. The Villa was built by the architect Flaminio Ponzio, developing sketches by Scipione Borghese himself, who used it as a villa suburbana, a party villa at the edge of Rome. Scipione Borghese was an early patron of Bernini and an avid collector of works by Caravaggio, who is well represented in the collection by his Boy with a Basket of Fruit, St. Jerome, Sick Bacchus and others. Other paintings of note include Titian's Sacred and Profane Love, Raphael's Entombment of Christ and works by Peter Paul Rubens and Federico Barocci.
Grand Canal
Tourist attraction
The Grand Canal is a canal in Venice, Italy. It forms one of the major water-traffic corridors in the city. Public transport is provided by water buses and private water taxis, and many tourists explore the canal by gondola. At one end, the canal leads into the lagoon near the Santa Lucia railway station and the other end leads into Saint Mark Basin; in between, it makes a large reverse-S shape through the central districts of Venice. It is 3,800 m long, 30–90 m wide, with an average depth of five meters.
Florence Baptistery
Romanesque Structure
The Florence Baptistery, also known as the Baptistry of Saint John, is a religious building in Florence, Italy, and has the status of a minor basilica. The octagonal baptistery stands in both the Piazza del Duomo and the Piazza di San Giovanni, across from Florence Cathedral and the Campanile di Giotto. The Florence Baptistery is one of the oldest buildings in the city, constructed between 1059 and 1128 in the Florentine Romanesque style. Although the Florentine style did not spread across Italy as widely as the Pisan Romanesque or Lombard styles, its influence was decisive for the subsequent development of architecture, as it formed the basis from which Francesco Talenti, Leon Battista Alberti, Filippo Brunelleschi, and the other architects created Renaissance architecture. In the case of the Florentine Romanesque, one can speak of "proto-renaissance", but at the same time an extreme survival of the late antique architectural tradition in Italy, as in the cases of the Basilica of San Salvatore in Spoleto, the Temple of Clitumnus, the church of Sant'Alessandro in Lucca. The Baptistry is renowned for its three sets of artistically important bronze doors with relief sculptures. The south doors were done by Andrea Pisano and the north and east doors by Lorenzo Ghiberti. The east doors were dubbed by Michelangelo the "Gates of Paradise".
Capitoline Museums
Museum
The Capitoline Museums are a group of art and archeological museums in Piazza del Campidoglio, on top of the Capitoline Hill in Rome, Italy. The historic seats of the museums are Palazzo dei Conservatori and Palazzo Nuovo, facing on the central trapezoidal piazza in a plan conceived by Michelangelo Buonarroti in 1536 and executed over a period of more than 400 years. The history of the museums can be traced to 1471, when Pope Sixtus IV donated a collection of important ancient bronzes to the people of Rome and located them on Capitoline Hill. Since then, the museums' collection has grown to include a large number of ancient Roman statues, inscriptions, and other artifacts; a collection of medieval and Renaissance art; and collections of jewels, coins, and other items. The museums are owned and operated by the municipality of Rome. The statue of a mounted rider in the centre of the piazza is of Emperor Marcus Aurelius. It is a copy, the original being housed on-site in the Capitoline museum. Many Roman statues were destroyed on the orders of Christian Church authorities in the Middle Ages; this statue was preserved in the erroneous belief that it depicted the Emperor Constantine, who made Christianity the official state religion of the Roman empire.
Basilica of Santa Croce, Florence
Italian Gothic Structure
The Basilica di Santa Croce is the principal Franciscan church in Florence, Italy, and a minor basilica of the Roman Catholic Church. It is situated on the Piazza di Santa Croce, about 800 metres south east of the Duomo. The site, when first chosen, was in marshland outside the city walls. It is the burial place of some of the most illustrious Italians, such as Michelangelo, Galileo, Machiavelli, Foscolo, Gentile and Rossini, thus it is known also as the Temple of the Italian Glories.
Catacombs of Rome
Tourist attraction
The Catacombs of Rome are ancient catacombs, underground burial places under Rome, Italy, of which there are at least forty, some discovered only in recent decades. Though most famous for Christian burials, either in separate catacombs or mixed together, they began in the 2nd century AD, mainly as a response to overcrowding and shortage of land. Many believe that catacombs came about to help persecuted Christians to bury their dead secretly, but this is discounted by modern scholars, as the sites were well known, and the considerable smell when they were in operation was enough to give them away. The soft volcanic tuff rock under Rome is highly suitable for tunnelling, as it is softer when first exposed to air, hardening afterwards. Many have kilometres of tunnels, in up to four storeys. The Christian catacombs are extremely important for the art history of Early Christian art, as they contain the great majority of examples from before about 400 AD, in fresco and sculpture, as well as gold glass medallions. The Jewish catacombs are similarly important for the study of Jewish art at this period. A number of dubious relics of catacomb saints were promoted after the rediscovery of the catacombs.
Spanish Steps
Baroque Structure
The Spanish Steps are a set of steps in Rome, Italy, climbing a steep slope between the Piazza di Spagna at the base and Piazza Trinità dei Monti, dominated by the Trinità dei Monti church at the top. The Scalinata is the widest staircase in Europe. The monumental stairway of 135 steps was built with French diplomat Étienne Gueffier’s bequeathed funds of 20,000 scudi, in 1723–1725, linking the Bourbon Spanish Embassy, and the Trinità dei Monti church that was under the patronage of the Bourbon kings of France, both located above — to the Holy See in Palazzo Monaldeschi located below. The stairway was designed by architects Francesco de Sanctis and Alessandro Specchi.
Baths of Caracalla
Roman Structure
The Baths of Caracalla in Rome, Italy, were the second largest Roman public baths, or thermae, built in Rome between AD 212 and 216, during the reign of the Emperor Caracalla. Chris Scarre provides a slightly longer construction period 211-217 AD. They would have had to install over 2,000 tons of material every day for six years in order to complete it in this time. Records show that the idea for the baths were drawn up by Septimius Severus, and merely completed or opened in the lifetime of Caracalla. This would allow for a longer construction timeframe. They are today a tourist attraction.
Bargello
Italian Gothic Structure
The Bargello, also known as the Bargello Palace, Museo Nazionale del Bargello, or Palazzo del Popolo is a former barracks and prison, now an art museum, in Florence, Italy.
Pinacoteca di Brera
Art Gallery
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 cultural program of the Brera Academy, which shares the site in the Palazzo Brera.
Sforza Castle
Renaissance Structure
Sforza Castle is a castle in Milan, northern Italy. It was built in the 15th century by Francesco Sforza, Duke of Milan, on the remains of a 14th-century fortification. Later renovated and enlarged, in the 16th and 17th centuries it was one of the largest citadels in Europe. Largely remade by Luca Beltrami in 1891-1905, it now houses several of the city's museums and art collections.
Siena Cathedral
Italian Gothic Structure
Siena Cathedral is a medieval church in Siena, Italy, dedicated from its earliest days as a Roman Catholic Marian church, and now dedicated to Santa Maria Assunta. The cathedral itself was originally designed and completed between 1215 and 1263 on the site of an earlier structure. It has the form of a Latin cross with a slightly projecting transept, a dome and a bell tower. The dome rises from a hexagonal base with supporting columns. The lantern atop the dome was added by Gian Lorenzo Bernini. The nave is separated from the two aisles by semicircular arches. The exterior and interior are constructed of white and greenish-black marble in alternating stripes, with addition of red marble on the façade. Black and white are the symbolic colors of Siena, etiologically linked to black and white horses of the legendary city's founders, Senius and Aschius.
Bridge of Sighs
Arch Bridge
The Bridge of Sighs is a bridge located in Venice, northern Italy. The enclosed bridge is made of white limestone and has windows with stone bars. It passes over the Rio di Palazzo and connects the New Prison to the interrogation rooms in the Doge's Palace. It was designed by Antoni Contino and was built in 1602. The view from the Bridge of Sighs was the last view of Venice that convicts saw before their imprisonment. The bridge name, given by Lord Byron in the 19th century, comes from the suggestion that prisoners would sigh at their final view of beautiful Venice through the window before being taken down to their cells. In reality, the days of inquisitions and summary executions were over by the time the bridge was built and the cells under the palace roof were occupied mostly by small-time criminals. In addition, little could be seen from inside the Bridge due to the stone grills covering the windows. A local legend says that lovers will be granted eternal love and bliss if they kiss on a gondola at sunset under the Bridge of Sighs as the bells of St Mark's Campanile toll. This legend served as a plot line for the movie A Little Romance, featuring Laurence Olivier and Diane Lane.
Lido di Venezia
Tourist attraction
The Lido — or Venice Lido — is an 11 kilometres long sandbar located in Venice, northern Italy, home to about 20,000 residents. The Venice Film Festival takes place at the Lido every September.
Scrovegni Chapel
Tourist attraction
The Scrovegni Chapel, is a church in Padua, Veneto, Italy. It contains a fresco cycle by Giotto, completed about 1305, that is one of the most important masterpieces of Western art.
Piazza dei Miracoli
Tourist attraction
The Piazza del Duomo is a wide, walled area to the north of central Pisa, Tuscany, Italy, recognized as one of the main centers for medieval art in the world. It is a sacred area, Catholic Christian religion, and it is dominated by four great sacred edifices: the Duomo, the Campanile, the Baptistry and the Campo Santo. Partly paved and partly grassed, it hosts also other buildings such as the old hospital and the Museum of the "Opera del Duomo"
Domus Aurea
Roman Structure
The Domus Aurea was a large landscaped portico villa built by the Emperor Nero in the heart of ancient Rome, after the great fire in 64 AD had cleared away the aristocratic dwellings on the slopes of the Palatine Hill.
Palazzo Farnese
Palace
Palazzo Farnese is one of the most important High Renaissance palaces in Rome. Owned by the Italian state, it was given to the French Government in 1936 for a period of 99 years, and currently serves as the French embassy in Italy. First designed in 1517 for the Farnese family, the building expanded in size and conception when Alessandro Farnese became Pope Paul III in 1534, to designs by Antonio da Sangallo the Younger. Its building history involved some of the most prominent Italian architects of the 16th century, including Michelangelo, Jacopo Barozzi da Vignola and Giacomo della Porta. At the end of the 16th century, the important fresco cycle of The Loves of the Gods in the Farnese Gallery was carried out by the Bolognese painter Annibale Carracci, marking the beginning of two divergent trends in painting during the 17th century, the Roman High Baroque and Classicism. The famous Farnese sculpture collection, now in the National Archeological Museum of Naples, as well as other Farnese collections, now mostly in Capodimonte Museum in Naples, were accommodated in the palace.
Rialto Bridge
Arch Bridge
The Rialto Bridge is one of the four bridges spanning the Grand Canal in Venice, Italy. It is the oldest bridge across the canal, and was the dividing line for the districts of San Marco and San Polo.
Aquarium of Genoa
Tourist attraction
The Aquarium of Genoa is the largest aquarium in Italy and among the largest in Europe. Located in the old harbor area of Genoa, Italy, the 33,000-square-foot aquarium is a member organization of the European Association of Zoos and Aquaria, and welcomes more than 1.2 million visitors each year.
Santa Maria sopra Minerva
Italian Gothic Structure
Santa Maria sopra Minerva is one of the major churches of the Roman Catholic Order of Preachers, better known as the Dominicans. The church's name derives from the fact that the first Christian church structure on the site was built directly over the ruins or foundations of a temple dedicated to the Egyptian goddess Isis, which had been erroneously ascribed to the Greco-Roman goddess Minerva. The church is located in the Piazza della Minerva one block behind the Pantheon in the Pigna rione of Rome, Italy, within the ancient district known as the Campus Martius. The present church and disposition of surrounding structures is visible a detail from the Nolli Map of 1748. The Minerva has been a titular church since 1557 and a minor basilica since 1566. The church's first titular cardinal was Michele Ghislieri who would become Pope Pius V in 1566 and raise the church to the level of minor basilica that same year. The current Cardinal Priest of the Titulus Sanctae Mariae supra Minervam has been Cormac Murphy-O'Connor since 2001, when he was Archbishop of Westminster, the senior position in the English Catholic church, from which he has since retired.
Museo Egizio
Museum
The Museo Egizio is a museum in Turin, Italy, specialising in Egyptian archaeology and anthropology. It houses the world's second largest collections of Egyptian antiquities after Cairo. In 2006 it received 554,911 visitors.
Piazza della Signoria
Tourist attraction
Piazza della Signoria is an L-shaped square in front of the Palazzo Vecchio in Florence, Italy. It was named after the Palazzo della Signoria, also called Palazzo Vecchio. It is the focal point of the origin and of the history of the Florentine Republic and still maintains its reputation as the political hub of the city. It is the meeting place of Florentines as well as the numerous tourists, located near Ponte Vecchio and Piazza del Duomo and gateway to Uffizi Gallery.
Naples National Archaeological Museum
Archaeological Museum
The Naples National Archaeological Museum is a museum in Naples, southern Italy, at the northwest corner of the original Greek wall of the city of Neapolis. The museum contains a large collection of Roman artifacts from Pompeii, Stabiae and Herculaneum. The collection includes works of the highest quality produced in Greek, Roman and Renaissance times. It is the most important Italian archaeological museum.
Santa Maria delle Grazie
Renaissance Structure
Santa Maria delle Grazie is a church and Dominican convent in Milan, northern Italy, included in the UNESCO World Heritage sites list. The church contains the mural of The Last Supper by Leonardo da Vinci, which is in the refectory of the convent.
Mole Antonelliana
Museum
The Mole Antonelliana is a major landmark building in Turin, Italy. It is named for the architect who built it, Alessandro Antonelli. A mole is a building of monumental proportions. Construction began in 1863, soon after Italian unification, and was completed in 1889, after the architect's death. Originally conceived of as a synagogue, it now houses the Museo Nazionale del Cinema, and is the tallest museum in the world. The building was conceived and constructed as a synagogue. The Jewish community of Turin had enjoyed full civil rights since 1848, and at the time the construction of the synagogue began, Turin was the capital of the new Italian state, a position it held only from 1860 to 1864. The community, with a budget of 250,000 lire and the intention of having a building worthy of a capital city, hired Antonio Antonelli. Antonelli had recently added a 121 metre-high dome and spire to the seventeenth-century Basilica of San Gaudenzio in Novara and promised to build a synagogue for 280,000 lire. The relationship between Antonelli and the Jewish community was not happy. He proposed a series of modifications which raised the final height to 167.5 meters, over 46 meters higher than the dome in the original design. Such changes, in addition to greater costs and construction time than were originally anticipated, did not please the Jewish community and construction was halted in 1869, with a provisional roof.
Piz Bernina
Mountain
Piz Bernina is the highest mountain of the Eastern Alps and the highest point of the Bernina Range the highest peak in south Rhetic Alps. It is also the farthest easterly mountain higher than 4,000 m in the Alps, the highest point of the Swiss canton of Graubünden, and the fifth-most prominent peak in the Alps. Piz Bernina is located near St. Moritz, one of the best known resorts in the Swiss Alps. The mountain takes its name from the Bernina Pass and was given in 1850 by Johann Coaz, who also made the first ascent. The prefix Piz comes from the Romansch language predominant in Graubunden and any mountain with that name immediately points to its location in South-Eastern Switzerland.
Churches of Rome
Tourist attraction
There are more than 900 churches in Rome, including some notable Roman Catholic Marian churches. Most, but not all, of these are Roman Catholic. The first churches of Rome originated in places where Christians met. They were divided into three categories: ⁕the houses of private Roman citizens; ⁕the deaconries; ⁕other houses holding a titulus;
Bocca della Verità
Tourist attraction
La Bocca della Verità is an image, carved from Pavonazzo marble, of a man-like face, located in the portico of the church of Santa Maria in Cosmedin in Rome, Italy. The sculpture is thought to be part of a first-century ancient Roman fountain, or perhaps a manhole cover, portraying one of several possible pagan gods, probably Oceanus. Most Romans believe that the 'Bocca' represents the ancient god of the river Tiber. The most famous characteristic of the Mouth, however, is its role as a lie detector. Starting from the Middle Ages, it was believed that if one told a lie with one's hand in the mouth of the sculpture, it would be bitten off. The piece was placed in the portico of the Santa Maria in Cosmedin in the 17th century. This church is also home to the supposed relics of Saint Valentine.
Raphael Rooms
Tourist attraction
The four Raphael Rooms form a suite of reception rooms, the public part of the papal apartments in the Palace of the Vatican. They are famous for their frescoes, painted by Raphael and his workshop. Together with Michelangelo's ceiling frescoes in the Sistine Chapel, they are the grand fresco sequences that mark the High Renaissance in Rome. The Stanze, as they are commonly called, were originally intended as a suite of apartments for Pope Julius II. He commissioned Raphael, then a relatively young artist from Urbino, and his studio in 1508 or 1509 to redecorate the existing interiors of the rooms entirely. It was possibly Julius' intent to outshine the apartments of his predecessor Pope Alexander VI, as the Stanze are directly above Alexander's Borgia Apartment. They are on the third floor, overlooking the south side of the Belvedere Courtyard. Running from east to west, as a visitor would have entered the apartment, but not following the sequence in which the Stanze were frescoed, the rooms are the Sala di Costantino, the Stanza di Eliodoro, the Stanza della Segnatura and the Stanza dell'Incendio del Borgo.
Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II
Tourist attraction
The Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II is one of the world's oldest shopping malls. Housed within a four-story double arcade in central Milan, the Galleria is named after Vittorio Emanuele II, the first king of the Kingdom of Italy. It was designed in 1861 and built by Giuseppe Mengoni between 1865 and 1877.
Teatro Massimo, Palermo
Opera House
The Teatro Massimo Vittorio Emanuele is an opera house and opera company located on the Piazza Verdi in Palermo, Sicily. It was dedicated to King Victor Emanuel II. It is the biggest in Italy, and one of the largest of Europe, renowned for its perfect acoustics.
Palazzo Barberini
Baroque Structure
Palazzo Barberini is a palace in Rome, facing the Piazza Barberini in Rione Trevi. It houses the Galleria Nazionale d'Arte Antica.
Costa Smeralda
Tourist attraction
The Costa Smeralda is a coastal area and tourist destination in northern Sardinia, Italy, with a length of some 20 km, although the term originally designed only a small stretch in the commune of Arzachena. With white sand beaches, a golf club, private jet and helicopter service, and hotels costing up to US$2000–3000 per night in the peak season, the area has drawn celebrities, business leaders and other affluent visitors. In a study released by the European luxury real estate brokerage Engel & Völkers, Costa Smeralda is the most expensive location in Europe. House prices reach up to 300,000 euros per square meter. The main towns and villages in the area, built according to a detailed urban plan, are Porto Cervo, Liscia di Vacca, Capriccioli and Romazzino. Archaeological sites include the Li Muri Giants' graves. Each September the Sardinia Cup sailing regatta is held off the coast. Polo matches are held between April and October at Gershan near Arzachena. Other attractions include a film festival in Tavolara and a vintage car rally. Development of the area started in 1961, and was financed by a consortium of companies led by Prince Karim Aga Khan. Spiaggia del Principe, one of the beaches along the Costa Smeralda, was named after this Ishmaelite Prince. Architects involved in the project included Busiri Vici, Jacques Couëlle, Savin Couëlle and Vietti.
Biblioteca Ambrosiana
Museum
The Biblioteca Ambrosiana is a historic library in Milan, Italy, also housing the Pinacoteca Ambrosiana, the Ambrosian art gallery. Named after Ambrose, the patron saint of Milan, it was founded by Cardinal Federico Borromeo, whose agents scoured Western Europe and even Greece and Syria for books and manuscripts. Some major acquisitions of complete libraries were the manuscripts of the Benedictine monastery of Bobbio and the library of the Paduan Vincenzo Pinelli, whose more than 800 manuscripts filled 70 cases when they were sent to Milan and included the famous Iliad, the Ilia Picta.
Museo Civico di Storia Naturale di Milano
Museum
The Museo Civico di Storia Naturale di Milano was founded in 1838 when naturalist Giuseppe de Cristoforis donated his collections to the city of Milan, Italy. Its first director was Giorgio Jan. The Milan Natural History Museum is located within a 19th-century building in the Indro Montanelli Garden, near the historical city gate of Porta Venezia. The structure was built between 1888 end 1893 in Neo-Romanesque style with Gothic elements. The museum is divided in five different permanent sections: Mineralogy; Paleontology; Natural History of Man; Invertebrate Zoology; and Vertebrate Zoology. The museum also exhibits the largest Italian collection of full size dioramas that allow visitors to observe some peculiar aspects of various ecosystems.
Royal Palace of Turin
Palace
Royal Palace of Turin or Palazzo Reale, is a palace in Turin, northern Italy. It was the royal palace of the House of Savoy. It was modernised greatly by the French born Madama Reale Christine Marie of France in the 17th century. The palace was worked on by Filippo Juvarra. It includes the Palazzo Chiablese.
Basilica of Saint Anthony of Padua
Romanesque Structure
The Pontifical Basilica of Saint Anthony of Padua is a Roman Catholic church and minor basilica in Padua, northern Italy. Although the Basilica is visited as a place of pilgrimage by people from all over the world, it is not the titular cathedral of the city, a title belonging to the Cathedral-Basilica of St. Mary of Padua. The basilica is known locally as "il Santo". It is one of the eight international shrines recognized by the Holy See.
Piazza Venezia
Tourist attraction
Piazza Venezia is a major circus and the central hub of Rome, Italy, in which many thoroughfares intersect, like Via dei Fori Imperiali and Via del Corso. It takes its name from Venice, after the Venetian Cardinal, Pietro Barbo who had built Palazzo Venezia, a palace set next to church of Saint Mark, also nearby, the patron saint of Venice. Palazzo Venezia was the former embassy of the city of the Republic of Venice to Rome. The piazza or square is at the foot of the Capitoline Hill and next to Trajan's Forum. The main artery, the Viale di Fori Imperiali starts there, leading past the Roman Forum and to the Colosseum. It is dominated by the imposing Monument to Vittorio Emanuele II, first king of Italy. In 2009, during excavations for the Rome C Metro Line, ancient remains of what has been identified as emperor Hadrian's Athenaeum were unearthed in the middle of the square.
Royal Palace of Naples
Palace
The Royal Palace of Naples is located in central Naples, southern Italy. It was one of the four residences near Naples used by the Bourbon Kings during their rule of the Kingdom of Two Sicilies: the others were the palaces of Caserta, Capodimonte overlooking Naples, and the third Portici, on the slopes of Vesuvius.
Pyramid of Cestius
Tourist attraction
The Pyramid of Cestius is an ancient pyramid in Rome, Italy, near the Porta San Paolo and the Protestant Cemetery. It stands at a fork between two ancient roads, the Via Ostiensis and another road that ran west to the Tiber along the approximate line of the modern Via della Marmorata. Due to its incorporation into the city's fortifications, it is today one of the best-preserved ancient buildings in Rome.
Teatro Comunale di Bologna
Opera House
The Teatro Comunale di Bologna is an opera house in Bologna, Italy, and is one of the most important opera venues in Italy. Typically, it presents eight operas with six performances during its November to April season. While there had been various theatres presenting opera in Bologna since the early 17th century, they had either fallen into disuse or burnt down. However, from the early 18th century, the Teatro Marsigli-Rossi had been presenting operatic works by popular composers of the day including Vivaldi, Gluck, and Niccolò Piccinni. The Teatro Malvezzi, built in 1651, burned down in February 1745 and this event prompted the construction of a new public theatre, the Nuovo Teatro Pubblico, as the Teatro Communale was first called. It was to be the first major opera house to be constructed with public funds and owned by the municipality. Although 35 of its 99 boxes were sold for private use, the terms of ownership were also unique in that they have been described as being limited to "the right to rent in perpetuity" rather than outright ownership and control. Designed by the architect Antonio Galli Bibiena - although opposed by several others who lost the design competition - the theatre was inaugurated on 14 May 1763 with a performance of Gluck's Il trionfo di Clelia, an opera which the composer had written for the occasion. A bell-shaped auditorium consisting of four tiers of boxes plus a royal box and small gallery with a ceiling decorated as if open to the sky was built primarily of masonry as a protection against fire. However, much work remained unfinished, the facade in particular which was not completed until 1936. Also, many of the backstage facilities which would allow for the presentations of operas were unfinished and only completed due to competition from another theatre in 1805.
Mirabilandia
Amusement Park
Mirabilandia is an Italian amusement park, located at Savio, frazione of Ravenna, in Emilia-Romagna. It has an area of 30 hectares, with an additional waterworld area of 10 hectares, called Mirabilandia Beach. The most notable attractions are the Katun inverted roller coaster and the iSpeed launched coaster. It has the world's tallest Watercoaster, the "Divertical" with a height of 60 m. It houses the 90 metre tall Eurowheel, Europe's second tallest Ferris wheel.
Doria Pamphili Gallery
Tourist attraction
The Doria Pamphilj Gallery is a large art collection housed in the Palazzo Doria Pamphilj in Rome, Italy. It is situated between the Via del Corso and Via della Gatta. The principal entrance is on the Via del Corso. The palace facade on the Via del Corso is adjacent to the church of Santa Maria in Via Lata. Like the palace, it is still privately owned by the princely Roman family Doria Pamphilj.
Museo Correr
Art Gallery
The Museo Correr is a museum in Venice, nortern Italy. Located in St. Mark's Square, Venice, it is one of the 11 civic museums run by the Fondazione Musei Civici di Venezia. The museum extends along the southside of the square on the upper floors of the Procuratorie Nuove. With its rich and varied collections, the Museo Correr covers both the art and history of Venice.
Santo Spirito, Florence
Renaissance Structure
The Basilica of Santa Maria del Santo Spirito is a church in Florence, Italy. Usually referred to simply as Santo Spirito, it is located in the Oltrarno quarter, facing the square with the same name. The building on the interior is one of the pre-eminent examples of Renaissance architecture.
Via Veneto
Tourist attraction
Via Veneto is one of the most famous and expensive streets in Rome, Italy. The official name is via Vittorio Veneto, after the Battle of Vittorio Veneto. Federico Fellini's classic 1960 film La Dolce Vita was mostly centered around the Via Veneto area. The circle drive "Via Veneto Terrace" is located in Clinton Township in front of the Antonini Estate.
Palermo Cathedral
Tourist attraction
Palermo Cathedral is the cathedral church of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Palermo, located in Palermo, Sicily, southern Italy. As an architectural complex, it is characterized by the presence of different styles, due to a long history of additions, alterations and restorations, the last of which occurred in the 18th century.
Palazzo Venezia
Palace
The Palazzo di Venezia is a palazzo in central Rome, Italy, just north of the Capitoline Hill. The original structure of this great architectural complex consisted of a modest medieval house intended as the residence of the cardinals appointed to the church of San Marco. In 1469 it became a residential papal palace, having undergone a massive extension, and in 1564, Pope Pius IV, to win the sympathies of the Republic of Venice, gave the mansion to the ambassadors of La Serenissima on condition that a part of the building should be kept as a residence for the cardinals—the Apartment Cibo—and that the Venetian Republic should provide for the building's maintenance and future restoration. The palazzo faces Piazza Venezia and Via del Plebiscito. It currently houses the National Museum of the Palazzo Venezia.
Piazza del Campo
Tourist attraction
Piazza del Campo is the principal public space of the historic center of Siena, Tuscany, Italy and is regarded as one of Europe's greatest medieval squares. It is renowned worldwide for its beauty and architectural integrity. The Palazzo Pubblico and its Torre del Mangia, as well as various palazzi signorili surround the shell-shaped piazza. At the northwest edge is the Fonte Gaia. The twice-a-year horse-race, Palio di Siena, is held around the edges of the piazza.
San Petronio Basilica
Italian Gothic Structure
The Basilica of San Petronio is the main church of Bologna, Emilia Romagna, northern Italy. It dominates the Piazza Maggiore. It is the fifteenth largest church in the world, stretching for 132 meters in length and 66 meters in width, while the vault reaches 45 meters inside and 51 meters in the facade. The basilica is dedicated to the patron saint of the city, Saint Petronius, who was the bishop of Bologna in the fifth century. The construction was a communal project of Bologna, not of the bishops: The property was a symbol of communal power that was not transferred from the city to the diocese until 1929; the basilica was finally consecrated in 1954. It has been the seat of the relics of Bologna's patron saint only since 2000; until then they were preserved in the Santo Stefano church of Bologna.
Monte Baldo
Mountain
Monte Baldo is a mountain in the Italian Alps, located in the provinces of Trentino and Verona. Its ridge spans mainly northeast-southwest, and is bounded from south by the highland ending at Caprino Veronese, from west by Lake Garda, from north by the valley joining Rovereto to Nago-Torbole and, from east, the Val d'Adige. The name derives from the German Wald; it appears for the first time in a German map in 1163. The summit is reachable through a cable car from the nearby town of Malcesine, lying on the Lake Garda.
Ortygia
Tourist attraction
Ortygia is a small island which is the historical centre of the city of Syracuse, Sicily. The island, also known as Città Vecchia, contains many historical landmarks. The name originates from the Ancient Greek ortyx which means "Quail".
Palazzo Grassi
Palace
Palazzo Grassi is an edifice in the Venetian Classical style located on the Grand Canal of Venice, northern Italy. It was designed by Giorgio Massari, and the building was completed between 1748 and 1772. The latecomer among the palaces on the Grand Canal of Venice, Palazzo Grassi has an academic classical style that is in contrast to the surrounding Byzantine Romanesque and Baroque Venetian palazzi. It has a formal palace façade, constructed in white marble, and lacking the lower mercantile openings typical of many Venetian patrician palaces. The Grassi family sold the palazzo in 1840, with ownership that followed passing through many different individuals. The Palazzo was purchased by the Fiat Group in 1983, under the late chairman Gianni Agnelli, and it underwent a complete restoration overseen by Count Antonio Foscari Widmann Rezzonico, the current owner of Villa Foscari. The group's aim was to transform Palazzo Grassi into an exhibition hall for the visual arts. It continues to be used as an art gallery today. Between 1984 and 1990, Pontus Hultén was in charge of the art museum which also contains a 600 seat outdoor theatre. Since 2006, the palace has been owned by the French entrepreneur François Pinault who exhibits his personal art collection there. It was also where Pinault's son Francois-Henri met actress Salma Hayek and it served as the location for their wedding vow renewal.
Palazzo Madama
Palace
Palazzo Madama is a palace in Rome that is the home of the Senate of the Italian Republic. It was built atop the ruins of the ancient baths of Nero, next to Piazza Navona. The terrain had been acquired in the Middle Ages by the monks of the Abbey of Farfa, who later ceded it to France. The new building was begun at the end of the 15th century and completed in 1505, for the Medici family. It housed two Medici cardinals and cousins, Giovanni and Giulio, who both later became popes as Leo X and Clement VII, respectively. Catherine de' Medici, Clement VII's niece, also lived here before she was married to Henry, son of King Francis I of France in 1533. As well as Cardinal Francesco Maria Del Monte, patron of the artist Caravaggio, who died here. The palace takes its name from Madama Margherita of Austria, illegitimate daughter of Emperor Charles V, who married another illegitimate son, Alessandro de' Medici and, after his death, Ottavio Farnese. Thus part of the art collection of the Florentine Medici family was inherited by the Farnese family. The current façade was built in the mid-1650s by both Cigoli and Paolo Maruccelli. The latter added the ornate cornice and whimsical decorative urns on the roof.
Palazzo Chigi
Palace
The Palazzo Chigi is a palace or noble residence in Rome and the official residence of the Prime Minister of the Italian Republic. Since April 2013, the occupant of Palazzo Chigi has been Enrico Letta. The Palazzo, overlooking the Piazza Colonna and the Via del Corso, was begun in 1562 by Giacomo della Porta and completed by Carlo Maderno in 1580 for the Aldobrandini family. In 1659 it was purchased by the Chigi family. It was then remodelled by Felice della Greca and Giovan Battista Contini. It has five floors, a broad stairway that leads to the living rooms, and a courtyard decorated with a fountain, designed by Giacomo della Porta. The fountain has been copied in many sites in Rome and other Italian cities. In 1878 it became the residence of the Austro-Hungarian Ambassador to Italy. In 1916 it was bought by the Italian state and became the seat of the Minister for Colonial Affairs. Later it was the official residence of the Italian Minister of Foreign Affairs. In 1961 it became the official meeting place of Council of Ministers whose President is the head of the Italian government. Palazzo Chigi is the official residence of Prime Minister of Italy. Since April 2013, the tenant of Chigi is Enrico Letta, Prime Minister of Italy.
Museo Poldi Pezzoli
Art Museum
The Museo Poldi Pezzoli is an art museum in Milan, Italy. The museum was originated in the 19th century as private collection of Gian Giacomo Poldi Pezzoli and his mother, Rosa Trivulzio, of the family of the condottiero Gian Giacomo Trivulzio, and has a particularly broad collection of Northern Italian and Netherlandish/Flemish artists.
Palazzo Madama e Casaforte degli Acaja
Palace
Palazzo Madama e Casaforte degli Acaja is a palace in Turin, northern Italy. It was the first Senate of the Italian Kingdom, and takes its traditional name from the embellishments it received under two queens of the House of Savoy.
Turin Cathedral
Baroque Structure
Turin Cathedral is the major Roman Catholic church of Turin, northern Italy. Dedicated to Saint John the Baptist, it was built during 1491–1498 and it is adjacent to an earlier campanile. The Chapel of the Holy Shroud, the current resting place of the Shroud of Turin, was added to the structure in 1668–1694.
Palazzo dei Normanni
Palace
The Palazzo dei Normanni or Royal Palace of Palermo is a palace in Palermo, Italy. It was the seat of the Kings of Sicily during the Norman domination and served afterwards as the main seat of power for the subsequent rulers of Sicily. Today it is the seat of the regional parliament of Sicily.
Basilica of San Zeno, Verona
Romanesque Structure
The Basilica di San Zeno is a minor basilica of Verona, Northern Italy. Its fame rests partly on its architecture and partly upon the tradition that its crypt was the place of the marriage of Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet. Together with the abbey which forms an annex, it is dedicated to St. Zeno of Verona.
Monte Titano
Mountain
Monte Titano is a mountain of the Apennines and the highest peak in San Marino. It stands at 739 m above sea level and is located immediately to the east of the capital, San Marino. It was inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2008 under the combined title "San Marino Historic Centre and Mount Titano". Inscribed under reference no. 1245 criteria iii, the two together encompass an area of 55 ha with a buffer zone of 167 ha. It encompasses the Mount Titano and the other structures such as the fortification towers, walls, gates and bastions, as well as a neo-classical basilica located on it and its slopes forming a small but unique urban conglomerate. Straddled on the ridge of Mount Titano is the city of San Marino of the Republic of San Marino on the eastern part of the Italian peninsula, it has a hoary history starting from early 4th century. According to the legend related to the Mount and its precincts a small monastery existed on top of the Mount during the 8th century. The mountainous landscape provides excellent views of its surroundings, and its isolated location ensured the needed seclusion for San Marino to survive as a Republic over the past several centuries.
Basilica di San Nicola
Tourist attraction
The Basilica di San Nicola is a church in Bari, southern Italy, that holds wide religious significance throughout Europe and the Christian world. The basilica is an important pilgrimage destination both for Roman Catholics and Orthodox Christians from Eastern Europe.
Villa of the Mysteries
Roman Structure
The Villa of the Mysteries or Villa dei Misteri is a well preserved ruin of a Roman Villa which lies some 400 metres northwest of Pompeii, southern Italy.
Villa del Balbianello
Villa
The Villa del Balbianello is a villa in the comune of Lenno, Italy, overlooking Lake Como. It is located on the tip of a small wooded peninsula on the western shore of the south-west branch of Lake Como, not far from the Isola Comacina and is famous for its elaborate terraced gardens.
National Archaeological Museum of Florence
Archaeological Museum
The National Archaeological Museum of Florence is an archaeological museum in Florence, Italy. It is located at 1 piazza Santissima Annunziata, in the Palazzo della Crocetta.
Cavallino Matto
Amusement Park
Il Cavallino Matto is the largest amusement park in Tuscany, open from March to October of each year. The park, the name of which means "The Crazy Little Horse" in Italian, is situated on 60,000 square metres of pine forest near the Marina di Castagneto Carduccio beach on the Tyrrhenian Sea and includes rides and dining facilities.
Villa San Michele
Villa
The Villa San Michele was built around the turn of the 20th century by the Swedish physician, Axel Munthe, on the ruins of the Roman Emperor Tiberius's villa, on the Isle of Capri, Italy. Its gardens have panoramic views of Capri town and its marina, the Sorrentine Peninsula and Mount Vesuvius. The villa and its grounds sit on a ledge at the top of the Phoenician Steps, between Anacapri and Capri, at 327 meters above sea level. San Michele's gardens are adorned with numerous relics and works of art dating from ancient Egypt and other periods of antiquity. They now form part of the Grandi Giardini Italiani. The story of the villa is recorded by Dr. Munthe in his book entitled The Story of San Michele, published in 1929. There have been numerous reprints since. In 1919–1920, Munthe was an unwilling landlord to the outrageous socialite and muse Luisa Casati, who took possession of Villa San Michele. This was described by Scottish author Compton Mackenzie in his diaries.
Basilica of San Domenico
Romanesque Structure
The Basilica of San Domenico is one of the major churches in Bologna, Italy. The remains of Saint Dominic, founder of the Order of Preachers, are buried inside the exquisite shrine Arca di San Domenico, made by Nicola Pisano and his workshop, Arnolfo di Cambio and with later additions by Niccolò dell'Arca and the young Michelangelo.
Palazzo Spada
Palace
The Palazzo Spada is a palace in the historic centre of Rome, Italy. It is located in the rione Regola, at Piazza Capo di Ferro, 13, very close to the Palazzo Farnese. It has a garden facing towards the River Tiber. The palace accommodates a large art collection, the Galleria Spada. The collection was originally assembled by Cardinal Bernardino Spada in the 17th century, by his brother Virgilio Spada and added to by his grandnephew Cardinal Fabrizio Spada,
Palazzo Carignano
Baroque Structure
The Palazzo Carignano is a historical building in the centre of Turin, Italy, which currently houses the Museum of the Risorgimento. It was once a private residence of the Princes of Carignano, after whom it is named. It is famous for its unique rounded façade. It is located on the Via Accademia delle Scienze.