1875 Reclus print CASTELLO ESTENSE, FERRARA, ITALY, #25

Description: Reclus01_25 1875 Reclus print CASTELLO ESTENSE, FERRARA, ITALY, #25 Nice print titled Palais de Ferrare, from wood engraving with fine detail and clear impression, approx. page size 27.5 x 18 cm, approx. image size is 18.5 x 13 cm. From La Nouvelle Géographie universelle, la terre et les hommes, 19 vol., 1875-94 (In English: The Earth and Its Inhabitants, 1878-94), great work of Elisee Reclus. Castello Estense The Castello Estense (‘Este castle’) or castello di San Michele (‘St. Michael's castle’) is a moated medieval castle in the center of Ferrara, northern Italy. It consists of a large block with four corner towers. On 3 May 1385, the Ferrarese people, driven to desperation by taxes and flooding that had brought ruin upon them, took themselves to the Marquis Niccolò II d'Este’s palace to ask the advice of Tommaso da Tortona, the high official held to be responsible for this grave situation. Nicolò tried to calm the revolt all day, but by the evening it was clear that the people's spirits were getting more and more angry and that the very safety of the Estensi was endangered. The order was therefore given to summon the disgraced Tommaso, who was given confession and communion and then given to the crowd, who literally tore him to pieces. This episode, which resulted later in the death of the leaders of the revolt, convinced the Marquis that the family’s palace (which is now the Palazzo Comunale) was insufficient to guarantee the security of the nobility in the event of riots. He therefore ordered the construction of a defensive fortress on the north side of the Palazzo, entrusting the project to the architect Bartolino da Novara. He used a pre-existing tower (the Torre dei Leoni), which was part of the defensive walls, at that period very much to the south of the present ones, running, roughly speaking, along the line of the present Corso Giovecca and Viale Cavour. The tower was joined by curtain walls to another three newly built for this project. Between the Este residence and the new fortress was built an aerial passageway (perhaps in wood) to allow people to flee from one to the other. As the city grew the city walls were moved, so the defensive function of the castle became less important and apartments began to be built in its interior, which was by now considered an annex to the court palace. From the time of Ercole I d'Este on, there are many records of construction of apartments, and of their enlargement and enhancement. The definitive transformation works were ordered by Ercole II after a fire in 1544, which had damaged the previous accommodation. The architect Girolamo da Carpi gave the castle the external appearance which can be still seen today, although the interior has been remodelled several times across the ages. After the departure of the Este to Modena, the castle became the residence of the Papal Legate who administered the Ferrarese territory as civil governor (for a maximum term of four years). There were few changes made to the structure of the building, the most obvious being the increase in height of the north ravelin (the room which currently houses the cafeteria). In 1860 Ferrara was annexed to the Kingdom of Italy. The castle, now state-owned, was bought for 70,000 liras in 1874 by the Province of Ferrara that utilized the structure as headquarters of the Prefecture. In the subsequent decades, the castle underwent many small restoration projects, especially between 1910 and 1930, when some very questionable attempts were done. During World War II it was severely damaged by Allied aerial bombing, thus it was partially reconstructed in 1946. In 2002, at the initiative of the Provincial administration, the "Castle for the City" project was started: it involved a massive, €2.7m restoration of the castle and a series of exhibition of international significance, such as: "The Triumph of Bacchus: Masterpieces From the Ferrara School at Dresden", inaugurated in 2002 by the then President of the Republic Carlo Azeglio Ciampi, and "A singular Renaissance: the court of Este in Ferrara", inaugurated in 2003 at the Centre for Fine Arts of Brussels and later in Ferrara at the presence of the then President of the European Commission Romano Prodi. In 2004 the whole project of restoration was completed with two significant events: the inauguration of the €1.7m new museum display ideated by archistar Gae Aulenti and the restoration and temporary opening to visitors of the Camerini d'Alabastro ("alabaster cabinets"), secret rooms built by Alfonso d'Este. Following the 2012 Northern Italy earthquakes, one of the towers partially collapsed and underwent restoration works. Ferrara, city, capital of Ferrara provincia, Emilia-Romagna regione, northern Italy, on the Po di Volano, a branch channel of the Po River, northeast of Bologna. Although it is believed to be the site of the ancient Forum Alieni, from which its name is derived, there is no record of Ferrara earlier than AD 753, when it was captured from the exarchate of Ravenna by the Lombards. It passed in 774 to the papacy, under which it became an independent commune by the 10th century. The city was occupied successively by Tedaldo di Canossa (988), Countess Matilda of Tuscany (1101), and Frederick I Barbarossa (1158), and its internal history in the 12th century is largely that of the conflict between the rival families of the Salinguerra and the Adelardi. The rights and claims of the latter passed in 1184 by marriage to the House of Este, which after 1240 finally established its undisputed rule over the city. Ferrara became the seat of a powerful principality and cultural centre but declined both commercially and politically after its incorporation into the Papal States in 1598. The seat of an Austrian garrison from 1832, it became part of the Kingdom of Italy in 1860. The only important survivals of the medieval city are the massive Castello Estense (Este Castle; 1385-1570) and the Cathedral of San Giorgio, consecrated in 1185, with later additions. Little else in the city has survived from the Middle Ages. The Palazzo del Comune and the Palazzo della Ragione are both extensively restored, and the university founded in 1391 is housed in a late 16th-century building whose library contains a valuable collection of manuscripts, including works by the poets Ludovico Ariosto and Torquato Tasso. Ariosto's house, where he died in 1533, is preserved. The principal artistic treasure of Ferrara is the magnificent series of palaces of the later 15th and 16th centuries. These palazzi include the Diamanti, housing the municipal art gallery and other museums; the Schifanoia with the civic museum; and the Ludovico il Moro, now a national archaeological museum housing the finds from the ancient Etruscan port of Spina. Ferrara is an archbishopric. Its churches of San Francesco, Corpus Domini, Santa Maria in Vado, and the Certosa (San Cristoforo) are also Renaissance buildings. Linked by rail with Bologna, Padua, Venice, Ravenna, and Comacchio, Ferrara is the centre of a flourishing agricultural area (fruit), much of it reclaimed marshland. The period following World War II saw a great expansion of industrial activity and the creation of a 6-square-mile (16-square-kilometre) industrial zone between Ferrara and Pontelagoscuro. The city's principal manufactures are chemicals, sugar, alcohol, shoes, and hemp products.

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Location: Zagreb, HR

End Time: 2024-11-16T07:44:32.000Z

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