28 July 2011

Genoa is a great town to visit.  The history is fantastic as Genoa grew into a great seafaring town and acquired substantial status as a result.  Of course  Christopher Columbus was supposed to born or at least spent part of his early childhood here (his parents are listed in the documents as being here).

Anyway the financial strength of the city was great and their influence over vast parts of present day Italy and surrounding lands was significant.  They claim to have the first modern style bank here, Bank of St George founded in 1407.  There local flag is the red cross of St George so it is identical to England (not the UK flag). 

The first settlers may have been the Etruscans (who later formed a large part of Rome) followed by the Greeks.  During the Second Punic wars it was destroyed by the Carthaginians (Modern Tunisia).  Allied with Rome it was occupied by the Ostrogoths after the fall of Rome.  For the following centuries is was occupied by various people and was of no real importance.  In 934 it was sacked by the Arabs.  By 1100 the city grew and was theoretically under the control of the Holy Roman Empire.  Genoa grew as one of the great seafaring cities along with Venice, Pisa and Amalfi.

The city grew in power and participated in the Crusades bringing back the Levant (a glass goblet which the Genovese considered the Holy Grail).

Strong families such as the Grimadli, Fieschi, Doria and Spinola controlled the city but it continued to prosper.  It had battles with the other towns and won over Venice and Pisa.  But in 1347 the Black Death came and the city collapsed.  Genoa was controlled then by the French and lost control of Sardinia and other lands.  It did have a fight with the Barbary Pirates.

At Christopher Columbus’s time the city came under the control of Spain.  Under Spanish rule the wealthy families did even better and amasses great fortunes.  The Balbi, Doria, Grimaldi, Pallavincini and Serra to name a few.  Artisans and sculptures came and architects designed and built many of the famous structures.  But in 1656-57 the plague hit again and half the people were killed.  Then the French tried to invade and were repelled but came back in 1684 and bombarded the city with 13,000 cannonballs.

The city declined gradually and was taken as French by Napoleon.  Garibaldi set out from Genoa in 1860  with his thousand men to try for a unified Italy.  Of course much later is was bombarded in WWII by the British.

Today it is a city of many things.  We found the renovated waterfront to be very enjoyable with the new Aquarium, renovated wharves, great eateries (Eataly being one).  The via Balbi and Girabaldi are streets with huge mansions that were owned by the wealthy.  Today they are international banks, museums and City Hall.  All are open more or less to walk into and they are fantastic.

There are several cable cars to get up the hills and one leads to a sea captain who sailed (actually motored) around the world and collect trinkets which are on display in a nice shown presentation at his house.

Genoa is a place of history but today with all the efforts to improve it has become a clean, safe city with a huge old town (largest in Europe) filled with shops and narrow winding streets.  The Port is active with cruise ships, cargo vessels and boat/ship repairs.  This is still a very nautical town that we did not spend enough time exploring.

Typical winding street in the old town.

Every one of the mansions along the main streets have these great entrances with fantastic ceilings painted hundreds of years ago.

This is City Hall.  They took over one of the old mansions and preserved the paintings and sculpture.  Free entry and they will even show you around.  I have never seen such a great public place persevered so well.

I guess the sculpture thought itchy scalp should be documented.

The aquarium is great but we came all the way here to see Manatees!  As always iceberg lettuce is the favorite food.

This is the Royal palace after the Savoy took over.  They bought the place from the wealthy owner and made it the palace.

Another Royal view.

Genoa from the water.