Description
Piazza Virgiliana is Mantua's vast garden square, on the edge of the historic centre towards the Lago di Mezzo: a park shaded by rows of tall trees, born where a harbour once lay, and dedicated to the Latin poet Virgil, a son of this land.
In the middle stands the monument to Virgil, in Carrara marble, designed by the architect Luca Beltrami and crowned by a large bronze statue by the Milanese sculptor Emilio Quadrelli. It was unveiled in 1927 and replaced a first monument, unveiled in 1801 and demolished in 1919.
The layout of the square is the one planned at the end of the 18th century: the architect Paolo Pozzo took his cue from French garden squares and planted four rows of tall trees. Along its sides stand the Museo diocesano Francesco Gonzaga and the Ospedale Grande di San Leonardo.
In the days of the Gonzagas there was water here. The Lago di Mezzo ran into an inlet used as a harbour, the ancona di Sant'Agnese, named after a convent later destroyed; an embankment crossed it and led to the church of Santa Maria dell'Argine.
Over time the harbour silted up, and in the 18th century it was filled in little by little, partly with rubble from buildings demolished in the city. The space was called piazza dell'Argine, and it was often flooded when the lake rose.
It was given its shape in 1797 by the French general de Miollis, governor during the occupation: he persuaded the municipality to turn it into a square for military drills, with a monument recalling that Mantua was Virgil's homeland. Ever since, the square has borne the poet's name.
The current monument was a long time in the making. It cost more than a million lire: 400,000 had been raised by a committee set up fifty years earlier, and the rest was put up by the municipality of Mantua and the State.
In the middle stands the monument to Virgil, in Carrara marble, designed by the architect Luca Beltrami and crowned by a large bronze statue by the Milanese sculptor Emilio Quadrelli. It was unveiled in 1927 and replaced a first monument, unveiled in 1801 and demolished in 1919.
The layout of the square is the one planned at the end of the 18th century: the architect Paolo Pozzo took his cue from French garden squares and planted four rows of tall trees. Along its sides stand the Museo diocesano Francesco Gonzaga and the Ospedale Grande di San Leonardo.
In the days of the Gonzagas there was water here. The Lago di Mezzo ran into an inlet used as a harbour, the ancona di Sant'Agnese, named after a convent later destroyed; an embankment crossed it and led to the church of Santa Maria dell'Argine.
Over time the harbour silted up, and in the 18th century it was filled in little by little, partly with rubble from buildings demolished in the city. The space was called piazza dell'Argine, and it was often flooded when the lake rose.
It was given its shape in 1797 by the French general de Miollis, governor during the occupation: he persuaded the municipality to turn it into a square for military drills, with a monument recalling that Mantua was Virgil's homeland. Ever since, the square has borne the poet's name.
The current monument was a long time in the making. It cost more than a million lire: 400,000 had been raised by a committee set up fifty years earlier, and the rest was put up by the municipality of Mantua and the State.