On the south-west outskirts of Bologna, lies the popular district of Barca in the administrative district called Reno. In this district, planned and in part built after the Second World War, is a unique residential and commercial building: the so-called “Train”. A structure almost 600 meters long, which owes its name, the Train, to its similarity to a train of many carriages that seems to curve along bending rail tracks. Designed in the early 60s by bolognese architect Giuseppe Vaccaro it was inaugurated in 1962 mainly as a housing building for working class families, mostly those who had emigrated for work from the South of Italy. Considered the backbone of the district it has a ground floor portico housing shops, with apartments on the two floors above. Vaccaro was an architect who designed some renowned buildings in the city of Bologna and in the case of the Train he focused the attention on making the best use of the economic resources available, using a language of contemporary architecture, very different from that of the local historical tradition. Each block has a staircase leading to four apartments, two on each floor, with the living rooms provided with balconies overlooking the convex part of the complex. The whole plan is shaped like the letter H with enclosed courts but with a lot of light coming in from the open portico at ground level and from the widening open space above towards the sky. Vaccaro left the wall facing in brick, with the supporting structures in reinforced concrete visible. The wooden fixtures, specifically designed for this project are a further example of how the building element was simplyfied and standardised. To the east of the Train is the public sector of the area. Here one finds a social centre, offices, a cinema, a restaurant, a church and a market with square. The Train of Barca is the contemporary expression of the portico, built in a new suburb, physically distant from the historic city, but strongly linked to it perpetuating the original idea of the bolognese portico’s function: that of a place which welcomes people, a place to meet and enjoy a stroll for both visitors and locals who live in the area. A civic place to be enjoyed by people from every walk of life and every social class.

In the 1200s piazza Maggiore was created by expropriating houses and in no time its market became the meeting place for citizens and visitors alike.
For the bankers it soon became necessary in the area to have one location where to place the exchange offices (banchi), as there were many currencies circulating in Bologna due to the very active commercial activities from all over the country and the rest of Europe. At the beginning of the 1400s, the existing buildings around the square were still of Medieval dating with wooden colonnaded porticoes. A first re-styling took place using brick, giving the buildings Gothic style façades and the porticoes octagonal brick pilasters supporting low arches, with side-street entrances to Via Pescherie Vecchie and to Via Clavature. Under the portico dei Banchi were some of the most important commercial and financial businesses of Bologna.
In the 1500s Jacopo Barozzi, known as "il Vignola", at the time the most important architect at the Roman court and working in Bologna at the building of the Basilica of San Petronio, was called to plan a more unified and elegant front. In 1548 the magnificent Renaissance-style portico that is still to be seen today started being built, with the work completed only in 1580. In the new project the arches giving access to the side streets were evidenced by higher ones recognizable also in the façade. It is very interesting and can be called an "economy" intervention, where the completion and reorganization of the existing was preferred to a demolition and new building.
The new long façade unified buildings both towards Via degli Orefici and in front of the Ospedale della Morte, in this way presenting a unified architectural backdrop to the square and also beyond it.
The portico becomes the Portico della Morte. The property belonged to the Hospital to confort those who were condemned to death, hence the name "della morte" (of death). Under this portico is the oldest bookstore of Bologna, Libreria da Nanni. Founded in 1825 it was the first to adopt the Parisian style stalls to put books on display, of which many rare editions of the time. In more recent decades Federico Fellini, Pier Paolo Pasolini and Umberto Eco were some amongst the many famous known to browse and shop here.
The next portico is that of the Pavaglione, extending from Via De’ Musei to Via Farini, flanking Via dell’Archiginnasio and Piazza Galvani. The portico owes its name to the Piazza del Pavaglione (now Piazza Galvani) where the silkworm market used to be, of which Bologna was the most important commercial producer for many centuries. Here was a pavilion to shelter the cocoons, hence the name of the portico.
The portico is that of the Archiginnasio building, the first seat of the University of Bologna.
It was commissioned by Pope Pius IV through Carlo Borromeo who entrusted the project to Antonio Morandi known as Terribilia. It was built in just more than one year and opened in1563. The two-level façade followed the local architectural style and materials, brick and sandstone with a colonnade with Corinthian capitals and with two bigger arches marking the entrances to the side streets of the main market. To recover some of the expenses of building the church of San Petronio, shops were opened under the portico, to be rented out.
Some historical commercial activities are still under this portico today, for example one of the oldest pharmacies of the city: the Farmacia del Pavaglione originally called the Farmacia della Morte belonging to Hospital, Ospedale della Morte (Hospital) which already in the 1500s was given permission to have its own apothecary. In the 1800s under this portico opened the Zanichelli bookshop where poet Giosuè Carducci would stay every day for hours to the point that he was eventually given a private room by the shop owner to write or browse and read books. Other longstanding commercial activities here are jewellers Veronesi and the elegant Zanarini coffee bar, on the corner between piazza Galvani and via Farini where the locals like to go and enjoy refreshments after shopping or after the struscio, the Italian word which defines the stroll in the shade of the portico.

The Baraccano, is a historic complex of civil and religious buildings near the Margherita Gardens. The name originates from barbacane Italian for guard tower of which there was one here guarding the city gate called Porta Santo Stefano. The property includes the sanctuary of the Madonna del Baraccano, the Conservatorio along Via Santo Stefano and other buildings in the square of the Baraccano. 
The complex began as a place of refuge for orphans, pilgrims and travelers at the start of the 1400s. In the 1500s it was made into a hospitality centre where poor young girls could be trained or taught a profession to ensure them a better future. The buildings always had close ties to the Bentivoglio family, city lords between 1401 and 1506 and their coat of arms is still visible on some of the capitals of the portico on Via Santo Stefano, which dates to the time of their last ruling period in Bologna at the time of John the II (Giovanni II). The portico was built over a long period: the first seven arches and the big archway date to the last decade of the 1400s, the following ones to the first half of the 1500s and the very last section to a time between 1682 and 1726. In 1779 the big arch on Via Santo Spirito was given a gabled Baroque design with a sculpture of a Madonna with Child. The present façade project is by architect Angelo Venturoli dating to the beginning of the 1800s. Originally there was another narrow passageway from via Santo Stefano to the Piazza del Baraccano, used by carts to transport goods and foodstuffs, but it was closed in the early1900s, with the walled-up section visible at today's street no. 119.
On Via Santo Stefano the portico was made of brick columns and arches supported by sandstone capitals, these decorated by geometric and floral motifs and with some presenting distinctive and original details worth paying attention to. The capitals of the first, fourth and seventh columns have engraved cherubs holding the Bentivoglio crest, the patrons at the end of the 1400s. Maybe they were sculpted as a reminder of the orphans of the Conservatorio of the Baraccano symbolizing the greatness of the Bentivoglio in helping the needy.
Another engraving on some of the capitals is that of a cross emerging from the mountains, symbol of the Benedictine Order who had a church nearby on Via Santo Stefano. There is also an interesting corbel engraving showing an elm and two crossed, lowered shields, symbols of peace which are similar to one belonging to the portico of the church of S. Maria del Baraccano also known as the Virgin Mary of Peace. It is a tradition in Bologna, still today, to go to this church on one's wedding day to ask the Virgin for a blessing of matrimonial serenity.
In the mid 1900s the complex was bought by the Council of Bologna and after a complete refurbishing it has always been used as the neighbourhood Council headquarters.

Via Galliera began at Porta Galliera and originally ended in front of the Cathedral of St. Peter's, already present in its original plan in the X century AD.
The street was the ancient Galeria road which went to the river port town of Galliera directly connected to the Po. With the creation of Via dell’Indipendenza in the second half of the 1800s the street changed and divided into two sections one of which is via Manzoni.
Via Galliera was nicknamed the Grand Canal of Bologna and has always been one of its most elegant and important streets. Until the late 19th century it was the North entrance to the city and the aristocrats considered it very prestigious and a privilege to build their residences commissioned to the most important architects of the time, along this street.
Along today's Via Manzoni are historical buildings with their porticoes such as Renaissance Palazzo Fava, now Palazzo delle Esposizioni, where, in the 1600s, the family of Carracci painters proved their greatness in frescoing the piano nobile of the palazzo. There is also Palazzo Ghisilardi, today seat of the Medieval Art Museum, one of the most beautiful noble palaces of Bologna of the 1400s. Here, from 1923, was one of the first Case del Fascio (Houses of Fascism) with inside it, amongst other amenities, a restaurant where, in 1929 Enzo Ferrari and his associates decided to start the Scuderia Ferrari.
At the crossing with via Galliera is Casa Castelli, of the 1400s and with a portico restored at the beginning of the 1700s. In this building opened the first postal office of Bologna in 1768!
At no. 4, is Palazzo Torfanini, refurbished in the 1700s by Torreggiani who didn't change the original portico of the 1500s. Here, between the 1880s and the 1920s was the prestigious salotto (an Italian word which defines a place for cultural gatherings) of Countess Carmelita Zucchini Solimei, open to the arts, to literature and to politics. Illustrious foreign visitors to Bologna would stop here, like the Prince of Wales and the Infanta of Spain and famous Italians such as the Duke of Aosta, Carducci, D'Annunzio and Eleonora Duse, Fogazzaro, Respighi, they were all welcome!
In the Casa Dalle Tuate, originally with a wooden portico, rebuilt in stone in the 1600s, are two reused capitals almost surely from the Bentivoglio palace destroyed in 1507. The capital on the corner pilaster shows the profile of Giovanni II Bentivoglio, lord of Bologna before the ruling of the popes: a rare portrait which survived the damnation of memory to which the family fell too. Facing the Casa is Palazzo Dal Monte, probable work of architect Peruzzi, with a raised portico of 5 arches supported by stone pilasters with columns with composite style capitals on the side facing the street.
Very original is Palazzo Aldrovandi Montanari, dating to the 1700s and with a Baroque façade designed by Torreggiani. The family, to avoid having a porticoed front, paid a fine as porticoes were compulsory for newly planned buildings.
Facing this building is Palazzo Felicini Fibbia with an elegant brick façade with portico. Here, in 1515 Leonardo da Vinci was a guest together with Giuliano dè Medici, in town for the meeting between pope Leo X and king Francis I, who was so incredibly impressed by the genius of Leonardo, to invite him to France.
Palazzo Bonasoni, of the late 1500s and by architect Antonio Morandi known as Terribilia, presents a raised portico with composite columns and capitals, which are amongst the most remarkable of local workmanship.
We reach Piazzetta della Pioggia where, besides the porticoed church dedicated to the Madonna della Pioggia, are some of the oldest renowned shops of the area, like the Drogheria (grocer's shop), opened at as an apothecary the beginning of the 1600s. After the square begins a maybe less noble Via Galliera but still historically important as we are reminded just before reaching the ancient city gate, by a plaque at no. 65, where, it states, Nicolò Copernicus in 1497 and 1500, made some of his "ingenious celestial observations".

Via Zamboni, is the heart of the University of Bologna: it is the oldest university of the Western world, believed to date back to 1088.
The street begins at Piazza di Porta Ravegnana and ends at Porta San Donato.
Buildings and porticoes of different styles and time periods are on the sides of a street anciently called “San Donato” which until the 1200s was an area of open fields. It was thanks to the powerful Bentivoglio family that it became important architecturally as they chose the area to build their palazzo, completely destroyed in a revolt against the family at the beginning of the 1500s.
The name of the street was changed into Zamboni, in 1867 to commemorate Italian patriot Luigi, student at the University of Bologna and probably one of the creators of the Italian flag.
From Piazza di Porta Ravegnana and walking along Via Zamboni you reach a small square with to its right the brick colonnade of palazzo Bianchetti, at the far end the façade of Palazzo Malvasia and to the left the church of San Donato, with a frescoed façade of architectural perspectives. Next to the church is an archway once the entrance to the Jewish Ghetto in the 1500s, with as keystone a sculpted mask with an open mouth. It is an original wine fountain connected to Palazzo Malvasia via a small pipe. It was the custom of the family on the occasion of an important reception or when a family member was elected to an important political office to pour wine from the mask, like from a fountain, in the street and then watch the people scramble to get a drink.
The street has porticoes on both sides, at times with pilasters others with different styled columns and capitals. To the left is palazzo Malvasia-Pannolini, followed by Palazzo Magnani, now a picture gallery, where in the main hall is a remarkable frescoed frieze by the Carracci. To the right palazzo Malvezzi De' Medici now seat of the Città Metropolitana di Bologna, so grand that via Zamboni isn't wide enough to allow its portico natural light, and for this it is called the "dark portico".
Natural light brightens the façade of the Basilica of San Giacomo Maggiore, a church dating to the 1300s and in which one can see the Bentivoglio Chapel, one of the most remarkable creations of the Early Renaissance of Bologna, and the Poggi Chapel of the 1500s by Pellegrino Tibaldi. Extremely elegant is the basilica's portico on via Zamboni, dating to the 1500s along which is the entrance to the Church of Santa Cecilia with splendid frescoes by the most renowned artists of the School of Bologna of the early 16th century.
The walk brings you to Piazza Verdi, enclosed by the buildings of the ancient Bentivoglio stables and by the Teatro Comunale (theatre), built on the ruins of where the ancient family palace used to be. The theatre by architect Antonio Galli di Bibiena in 1750, was completed with its façade only in 1937, planned with the wide terrace to allow the Fascist hierarchs a full view of the square.
Without a street portico is palazzo Paleotti originally a Medieval block and now the library and media centre of the University.
In what in the 1500s was the palazzo of the very powerful Cardinal Poggi, is now the Alma Mater of the University of Bologna. When still a private palace on the San Donato road at the beginning of the 1500s the Cardinal was granted permission to enlarge and embellish the property with plans probably by architect Tibaldi who followed the style and fashion of the city palazzi.
The building was refurbished and made even bigger to make it into the seat of the Institute of Sciences (Istituto delle Scienze) in 1711 with a project by Francesco Dotti, also the architect of the Sanctuary of the Madonna di San Luca. He added the library and a slightly projecting section of three arches to the portico.
During the 1800s a connection to palazzo Malvezzi was opened and it was later necessary to plan two new wings for the sides of the original palazzo Poggi and the Library, important additions which unified the front of the building block.
After palazzo Poggi there are other buildings with and without porticoes which go all the way to the gate of Porta San Donato. This gate was originally built in the 1200s but reworked over the centuries and in part demolished in the 1950s to improve traffic movement.





The portico of the Certosa . The portico is a covered passage starting from Via Saragozza, just before the Arco del Meloncello and ending at the Certosa cemetery using for its part reaching the city, the already existing section of the portico of San Luca.
It was planned by local architect Ercole Gasparini who encountered many difficulties in planning the portico, which was completed in 1834, after his death, with changes and simplifications to his original project. The architect also planned and supervised the first transformations of the old monastery of the Certosa into a monumental cemetery and two of his major works include the Monumental Entrance and the Chapel of the Intercession (Cappella del Suffragio).
Construction began in 1811 financed also by the enthusiastic citizens who made many donations. This building project was also seen a way of giving work to many labourers unemployed by years of economic crisis. Initially the architect sees the covered way as an extension of the cemetery with burial chambers in each archway and with more elegant chapels in the 18 head arches planned as bigger areas and evidenced in their decoration by pediments. This idea was a first in Europe, the plan being to try and recreate the ancient Roman funerary streets where tombs and mausoleums were on the sides of the road leading to the city.
The gallery was meant to redefine the perimeter of the main cloister area of the old monastery by continuing inside the cemetery and here connecting to the Chapel of the Intercession (Cappella del Suffragio) the new focal point of the complex.
Gasperini dies in 1829 before he could finish his work and new and simpler projects will be designed by his successor, engineer Luigi Marchesini.
In 1831 the arch on Via Saragozza is finished, as are 131 arches. The portico at that time went over the Sant'Isaia road to Casaleggio via the Guidi arch - demolished in 1934 to ease traffic, and over the Reno canal with a covered bridge, planned as monumental by Gasperini but simplified by Marchesini to an Ionic colonnade, which is what we still see today. The portico then joins the Certosa cemetery walls. Thanks to a generous bequest by economist Luigi Valeriani, the works will be finished by Marchesini in 1834, with the arches of the Certosa portico reaching the number of 220.
The portico becomes part of the city's history when in 1849 near arch 67, the Austrian troops execute Ugo Bassi and Giovanni Livraghi, two symbols of the Italian Risorgimento.
Changes took place with the building of the new Stadium dell'Ara and some of the arches had to be demolished to make room for the monumental entrance and the tower called the "Torre del Littorio". During WWII the arches closest to the stadium were adapted into apartments for those who had lost their homes in the bombings. Every archway facing the street was sealed by a wall and became a small studio: a total of 94 families found a temporary home in what was called the "Maratona condominium" by Italian writer and journalist Luca Goldoni.

By Antonella Merletto Architectural historian and Official Tour Guide.
Antonella has a degree in Architecture, a post-degree specialization in Ancient Greek and Roman Architecture and a PhD in Ancient Architecture. Antonella is British-Italian and is bilingual. She teaches History of Art, History of Architecture and Archaeology in various American Universities in Rome and is an Official Tour Guide.

Piazza Santo Stefano. The stroll that takes us to one of the most original and beautiful squares of Bologna, Piazza Santo Stefano starts from the great loggia of Palazzo della Mercanzia and continues along Via Santo Stefano's porticoes, the longest ancient street of the city.
The square gets its name from the basilica on its short South-East side. It is also known as Piazza delle Sette Chiese (Square of the Seven Churches), as the complex of the basilica encompasses seven different buildings grouped as one in the 5th century AD by Petronius, then Bishop of the city and who later became its patron saint. The basilica was built over a Roman temple of the pagan goddess Isis with the idea of recalling the Church of the Holy Sepulchre and the places of the Passion of Christ in Jerusalem.
The church is at a lower level than the square and over the centuries the joining of the two parts has been overcome in various ways with the final solution reached in 1991 by Luigi Caccia Dominioni, who planned the gentle basin shaped square leading to the church.
The square is surrounded by porticoed buildings of the Medieval and Renaissance time periods. The oldest of these porticoes still have the low wall joining the columns built originally to separate from the dirt of the road and its traffic the people walking under the archways.
Facing the Basilica, on the left is the complex of aristocratic palazzi bought and connected over time by the Isolani family. The façade of the 1400s above the elegant portico with marble Corinthian capitals, a Tuscan style still quite unusual at that time in Bologna, presents stylish Medieval windows each with a portrait in a round medallion as decoration. All the portraits have interesting 19th century hairstyles, undoubtedly added after a late restyling of the building.
From here one can reach Strada Maggiore walking through the passageway of the Corte Isolani.
Facing the Basilica on the right side of the piazza are the varied façades belonging to the Case Beccadelli-Tacconi buildings, followed by Casa Bianchi-Pasquini with a high portico with grooved sandstone columns supporting cross-vaulted ceilings, and then a series of merchant houses of the 15th century. Porticoes of different architectures and all unique: of notice is a Renaissance arcade imitating a triumphal arch with a splendid terracotta cornice, followed by a portico of the beginning of the 1400s with brick spiral column shafts, each one different to the next, and then a portico with octagonal plan column shafts and capitals of water-leaf design. The last of the Tacconi complex houses, forming a corner with the narrow Via de Pepoli shows some Romanic pieces and probably held one of the oldest Jewish synagogues of Bologna. Another curiosity? At no. 2 in this small street, in 1914 was the first historic Maserati family workshop. A plaque with the famous logo on the wall commemorates the place.
Palazzo Bolognini Amorini Salina closes the square, a grand and picturesque building. In 1525 Alfonso Lombardi and Nicolò da Volterra decorated with various terracotta heads the palazzo façade facing the square. The work was completed a century later by Giulio Cesare Conventi. These heads are all different: 26 are between the windows on the two upper floors of the façade whilst 13 are between the arches of the portico and seem to be people-watching: look out for Turkish man with his turban and the laughing devil, of incredible detail.
All these different buildings and porticoes with overlapping time periods and styles blend in perfect harmony. In fact, it is this irregularity of the parts with their remarkable differences that composes the architectural and urban masterpiece which is piazza Santo Stefano.

By Antonella Merletto Architectural historian and Official Tour Guide.
Antonella has a degree in Architecture, a post-degree specialization in Ancient Greek and Roman Architecture and a PhD in Ancient Architecture. Antonella is British-Italian and is bilingual. She teaches History of Art, History of Architecture and Archaeology in various American Universities in Rome and is an Official Tour Guide.

The portico of Via Farini is in the most elegant part of the historic centre, famous for its luxury shops and for the struscio (the Italian word which the locals use to define strolling in the shade of the portico). The street closes to the north the so-called Quadrilatero, where you find the markets and commercial areas.
This wide curved street is the outcome of the 1860 plan of engineer Coriolano Monti to connect four very old streets: Via de' Libri, Borgo Salamo, Ponte di Ferro, Miola. Once finished the street was named after politician Luigi Carlo Farini who had worked at the annexation of this part of Italy, Emilia to the Regno d'Italia (the Italian Kingdom).
To create the new street many steep steps, narrow arched side streets with dark small shops had had to be demolished with also the more noble buildings needing to be "straightened out" and in some cases with façades "moved back" to create a continuous front. Monti's Neo-Renaissance architecture aligned and unified the porticoed buildings of the new street, adapting the official National Unity Imperial style to the distinctive city context of Bologna, achieved of course, not without complaints by some angry citizens!
Along Via Farini are some of the most important and interesting buildings of the city such as Casa Saraceni, built at the beginning of the 1500s on the foundations of one of the 1200s, as stated in the plaque in vicolo San Damiano. A palazzo that became the seat for two ambassadors from the Veneto of pope Julius II after the Bentivoglio family was made to leave the city in 1510. The street has one side of the Archiginnasio now the Council Library but originally the seat of the University of Bologna until 1803 when Napoleon will have it moved to Palazzo Poggi, in Via Zamboni. In 1842 in the building's Hall of Mathematical Sciences (Sala delle Scienze Matematiche) composer Gaetano Donizetti directed the Stabat Mater by Gioacchino Rossini.
Under its portico on the corner between piazza Galvani and via Farini is the renowned Bar Zanarini where the locals like to go and enjoy refreshments after their shopping or the struscio.
Buildings of notice are the eclectic Palazzo of the Cassa di Risparmio bank building by architect Giuseppe Mengoni with an opulent portico decorated by ornate -still working! metal lamps, or, on the other side of the street, Palazzo Guidotti with a portico with original capitals of the 1500s along Via Farini and friezes with engraved profiles of important people on its side in Piazza Cavour, there is even that of the architect of the building, Coriolano Monti.
Piazza Cavour was planned to create an elegant square for government and institutional buildings, particularly banks. The urban plan by Monti made porticoes mandatory and to be typologically similar. The square was opened in 1867 and eventually designed as a garden in 1870, with allotted areas for flowerbeds connected by pathways, all surrounded by a fence. The water sprinkling from the fountain is from the restored branch of the Roman aqueduct and the bust of Cavour, first Italian Prime Minister, was placed in the square in 1892.
The most interesting building here is the Bologna headquarters of the Banca d'Italia, by architect Antonio Cipolla, completed in 1865. It's has a Neo-Renaissance façade and all the ceilings of the portico frescoed by Gaetano Lodi who on each vaulted section painted historical events, geographical explorations, discoveries, and cities with their coat of arms.
Last to be mentioned is Palazzo Pizzardi now seat of the Tribunal, was completely refurbished in 1868 by architect Antonio Zannoni, who had to dramatically re-organize the side on via Farini as the building had to be moved back with a portico to fit into the new street alignment complying to the new urban rules.
Later, in 1893, along via Farini, on the west side of the Cassa di Risparmio building, a new square dedicated to economist Marco Minghetti was opened. This was the final touch which together with Piazza Cavour, created in this part of town the idea of a garden-city.

By Antonella Merletto Architectural historian and Official Tour Guide.
Antonella has a degree in Architecture, a post-degree specialization in Ancient Greek and Roman Architecture and a PhD in Ancient Architecture. Antonella is British-Italian and is bilingual. She teaches History of Art, History of Architecture and Archaeology in various American Universities in Rome and is an Official Tour Guide.

Strada Maggiore is one of the oldest streets of Bologna. From Roman times, it has been one of the main entrances to the town from the via Aemilia. It starts at Porta Ravegnana square (Piazza di Porta Ravegnana). In Medieval times this is where there was a city gate where the San Vitale road going to Ravenna started. "Strada" was the definition of only those streets that started from this square, amongst which Strada Maggiore.
Many historical triumphal parades into Bologna were via this street, for example that of pope Julius II in 1506 or of Giuseppe Garibaldi in 1860. Its porticoes vary in height, architecture, and history: from ceilings made of wooden horizontal beams to those with high groin vaults, supported by pillars or columns with smooth, octagonal, or composite shafts with capitals going from water-leaf design to composite Corinthian.
From Piazza di Porta Ravegnana in the direction of Porta Maggiore, the first notable portico is the one enclosing the church of Saints Bartolomeo and Gaetano. Planned at the beginning of the 1500s as civic portico of a palazzo for the Gozzadini family, by Andrea Marchesi known as Formigine it is a masterpiece of Renaissance architecture with its wide full archways and sandstone pilasters decorated with candelabra. Its function became that of a religious portico for the church as the palazzo was never built.
Slightly further along is the portico of Casa Isolani of the 1200s where tall oak supports, 9 metres high! shape the portico upholding the top level of the house. In its ceiling are three arrows connected to various legends of which one is that three crooks whilst trying to rob a passer-by were distracted by a naked woman and shot their arrows at the ceiling by mistake.
Many important people have strolled along Strada Maggiore's porticos over the centuries, some living in the palazzi above them, like Gioachino Rossini, Giosuè Carducci and tenor Domenico Donzelli. Some of these buildings were famous for cultural gatherings, the salotti, like that of the Rossini home where the most important men of culture of Bologna would attend, or Palazzo Sanguinetti, which had writer Stendhal amongst its visitors.
Under the portico between Palazzo Sanguinetti and Casa Masetti is the lower part of the Tower of the Oseletti of the 12th century, originally one of the highest of Bologna, 70 metres high, a height forcibly reduced by the authorities to less than half.
At no 42, one cannot help but notice the keystone terracotta masks (mascheroni) of the late 1700s of the portico of Palazzo Bianchetti, once Tartagni: some are screaming and look uncannily like devils.
One of the most beautiful examples of porticoes and the widest of Bologna is the devotional “dei Servi” with interesting three-part shaft columns in Verona marble.
Its building started in the 1300s and the portico side on the Strada Maggiore was first frescoed in the 1400s. This work was covered by new ones in the 1600s these depicting episodes of the life of the Order of the Serviti founder. The portico was completed in the 1800s when the four-sided porch of the basilica Santa Maria dei Servi, was built. The church holds the Maestà painting by Cimabue.
These are the porticoes where every year at Christmas the Santa Lucia Fair is held.
Of the end of the 1700s is Palazzo Ercolani: now property of the University of Bologna.
Strada Maggiore ends at Porta Maggiore, "honorary gate" of the city from which the via Emilia continues through Romagna. This city gate was built in the second half of the 1200s and over the centuries adapted to the city's needs. Excavations at the beginning of the 1900s freed the original section which we can still see today.

By Antonella Merletto Architectural historian and Official Tour Guide.
Antonella has a degree in Architecture, a post-degree specialization in Ancient Greek and Roman Architecture and a PhD in Ancient Architecture. Antonella is British-Italian and is bilingual. She teaches History of Art, History of Architecture and Archaeology in various American Universities in Rome and is an Official Tour Guide.