Places to see in ( Brescia - Italy )

Places to see in ( Brescia - Italy )

Brescia is a city in the northern Italian region of Lombardy. On the eastern outskirts is the San Salvatore–Santa Giulia complex. This former monastery includes a basilica, cloisters and the Santa Giulia Museum, with items including Roman bronzes and medieval frescoes. On Cidneo Hill, Brescia Castle has a drawbridge and ramparts, plus the Luigi Marzoli Arms Museum, exhibiting ancient weapons and armor.

First impressions of Brescia may be mixed - when we visited we were disconcerted to find that the usual vaguely dodgy loiterers who hang around near railway stations were augmented by several beggars, and the seediness seemed to spread a long way into the surrounding streets. Brescia has grown larger and more industrialised in recent decades, with a new commercial district outside the historic centre, called Brescia Due. However, along with business prosperity has come a wave of immigration and new social problems. It's important to remember that although the central historic area is fairly compact, this is a large modern city with all that that entails.

The centre of Brescia, with its historic squares and lanes, is manageable on foot; a guidebook or map is useful for getting your bearings and establishing the chronology of this ancient city. Roman Brescia was called Brixia, a settlement that had already existed for hundreds of years, founded by Gauls. The Roman Forum was situated beneath the earlier hill stronghold along what is now Via Musei (but was the Decumanus Maximus). The Capitolium here, in modern-day Piazza del Foro, was the heart of town; a temple built by the Emperor Vespasian over earlier Republican-era buildings was discovered here in the nineteenth century, and has been partially reconstructed. Alongside is the town's Roman theatre. Further down Via Musei is the main town museum, the Museo della Città or Museo di Santa Giulia. The museum houses an extensive collection of local exhibits, with archaeological finds and collections from all periods of Brescia's past. It's housed in a monastery complex, Santa Giulia, which has a long and rich history and incorporates the Church of San Salvatore, begun by the Lombards in the eighth century.

Most Italian towns, when they felt the need for a grand new cathedral, simply amended or replaced their existing duomo. In Brescia, however, the new church was built alongside the old one, so visitors can visit an unusual example of an earlier church. The historic duomo, the Duomo Vecchio (or Rotonda) in Piazza Paolo VI is totally dwarfed by its imposing successor, the Duomo Nuovo, but the older of the two churches is by far the more interesting. The site has a long history; the building dates to the end of the eleventh century but is built on the site of an earlier basilica, which in turn was founded on Roman buildings. It's an unusual circular Romanesque church, with a calm atmosphere, some lovely decoration and chances to glimpse mosaics left from the earlier buildings on the site.

When you're exploring, you'll undoubtedly pass through Piazza della Vittoria, a large Fascist-era square (designed by Marcello Piacentini, the architect behind the EUR district of Rome). It's a striking example of 1930s architecture but it's unloved and used mainly as a car park. The town's older squares are much more appealing and lively, as are the nearby pedestrian shopping streets.

Piazza della Loggia is the prettiest square, and the seat of local administration. It's a good first stop for tourists as it's the location of the town's main tourist information office (open Monday-Friday 9:30am-12:30pm and 2pm-5:30pm; Saturdays 9:30am-1pm). The Renaissance Palazzo della Loggia, the town hall, was finished in the late sixteenth century with input from various architects including Jacopo Sansovino and Andrea Palladio. The clock tower (Torre dell'Orologio) here is reminiscent of the famous one in Venice, even down to the two crowning figures striking a bell (Venice: Torre dell'Orologio).

From Via dei Musei, winding lanes wind up to the Colle Cidneo hill, now a wooded park, which shadows the oldest part of the town. This was the site of the earliest settlement, dating back to the Bronze Age. On the summit is the town's Castello, a castle built on Roman foundations, now housing museums of weaponry and of the Italian Risorgimento.

( Brescia - Italy ) is well know as a tourist destination because of the variety of places you can enjoy while you are visiting Brescia . Through a series of videos we will try to show you recommended places to visit in Brescia - Italy

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