Mantua

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Mantua

Mantua (in the local dialect of Lombard language Mantua) is a city in Lombardy

Lombardy

Lombardy is one of the 20 regions of Italy. The capital is Milan. One-sixth of Italy's population lives in Lombardy and about one fifth of Italy's GDP is produced in this region....
, Italy

Italy

Italy , officially the Italian Republic , is a country located on the Italian Peninsula in Southern Europe and on the two largest islands in the Mediterranean Sea, Sicily and Sardinia....
and capital of the province

Province of Mantua

The Province of Mantua is a Provinces of Italy in the Lombardy region of Italy. Its capital is the city of Mantua....
of the same name.

Mantua is surrounded on three sides by artificial lakes created during the 12th century. These receive the waters from the Mincio

Mincio

Mincio is a river in the Lombardy region of northern Italy.Called the Sarca before entering Lake Garda, it flows from there about 65 km past Mantua into the Po River....
, which descend from Lake Garda

Lake Garda

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Encyclopedia

Mantua (in the local dialect of Lombard language Mantua) is a city in Lombardy

Lombardy

Lombardy is one of the 20 regions of Italy. The capital is Milan. One-sixth of Italy's population lives in Lombardy and about one fifth of Italy's GDP is produced in this region....
, Italy

Italy

Province of Mantua

Mincio

Lake Garda

Lake Garda is the largest lake in Italy. It is located in Northern Italy, about half-way between Venice and Milan. It is in an alpine region and was formed by glaciers at the end of the last ice age....
. The three lakes are called Lago Superiore, Lago di Mezzo, and Lago Inferiore ("Superior", "Middle," and "Inferior" Lakes). A fourth lake, Lake Pajolo, which once completed a defensive water ring of the city, dried up at the end of the 18th century.

Mantua is mentioned in William Shakespeare

William Shakespeare

William Shakespeare was an English people poet and playwright, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's preeminent dramatist....
's tragedy Romeo and Juliet
Romeo and Juliet

Romeo and Juliet is a Shakespearean tragedy written early in the career of playwright William Shakespeare about two young "Star-crossed" whose untimely deaths ultimately unite their feuding families....
. In this Romeo is sent into exile for killing Tybalt Capulet in a swordfight. Romeo subsequently leaves Mantua and returns to Verona

Verona

Verona is a city in Veneto, northern Italy, one of the seven provincial capitals in the region. It is one of the main tourist destinations in north-eastern Italy, thanks to its artistic heritage, several annual fairs, shows and operas, such as the lyrical season in the Arena, the ancient amphitheatre built by the Romans....
when he hears his love, Juliet, has died.

It is the seat of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Mantova.

History

The city was founded, probably around 2000 BC , on the banks of the Mincio

Mincio

Mincio is a river in the Lombardy region of northern Italy.Called the Sarca before entering Lake Garda, it flows from there about 65 km past Mantua into the Po River....
, on a sort of island which provided natural protection. In the 6th century BC it was an Etruscan

Etruscan civilization

Etruscan civilization is the modern English name given to the culture and way of life of a people of ancient Italy and Corsica whom the ancient Romans called Etrusci or Tusci....
village which, in Etruscan tradition, was re-founded by Ocno.

The name derives from the Etruscan god Mantus

Mantus

In Roman mythology and Etruscan mythology mythology, Mantus and his wife, Mania were gods of the underworld. They were associated with the city Mantua , which may derive its name from Mantus....
, of Hades

Hades

Hades refers both to the ancient Greek underworld, the abode of Hades, and to the god of the underworld. Hades in Homer referred just to the god; the genitive case , Haidou, was an elision to denote locality: "[the house/dominion] of Hades"....
. After being conquered by the Cenomani

Cenomani (Cisalpine Gaul)

The Cenomani , was an ancient tribe of the Cisalpine Gauls, who occupied the tract north of the Padus , between the Insubres on the west and the Veneti on the east....
, a Gallic

Gaul

Gaul is the name used for the region of Western Europe comprising part of present day northern Italy, France, Belgium, western Switzerland and the parts of the Netherlands and Germany on the west bank of the River Rhine....
tribe, the city was conquered by the Romans

Rome

Rome is the capital city of Italy and Lazio, and is Italy's largest and most populous city, with 2,724,347 residents in an urban area of some ....
between the first and second Punic wars

Punic Wars

The Punic Wars were a series of three wars fought between Ancient Rome and Carthage from 264 to 146 BC. They were probably the largest wars yet of the ancient world....
, confusing its name with Manto

Manto (Greek Mythology)

There are two figures in Greek mythology named Manto, one a daughter of Tiresias, the other a daughter of Heracles. The name Manto derives from Ancient Greek Mantis , "seer, prophet" ....
, a daughter of Tyresia (Tiresias

Tiresias

In Greek mythology, Tiresias was a blind prophet of Thebes , famous for being transformed into a woman for seven years. He was the son of the shepherd Everes and the nymph Chariclo; Tiresias participated in fully seven generations at Thebes, beginning as advisor to Cadmus himself....
). The new territory was populated by veteran soldiers of Augustus. Mantua's most famous ancient citizen is the poet Publius Vergilius Maro, Virgil

Virgil

Publius Vergilius Maro was a classical Roman poet, best known for three major works?the Bucolics , the Georgics and the Aeneid?although several Appendix Vergiliana are also attributed to him....
(Mantua me genuit), who was born near the city in 70 BC .

After the fall of the Roman Empire

Roman Empire

The Roman Empire was the Roman Republic phase of the Ancient Rome, characterised by an autocracy form of government and large territorial holdings in Europe and around the Mediterranean....
, Mantua was invaded in turn by Byzantines, Longobards and Franks

Franks

The Franks or Frankish people were a West Germanic ethnic group first identified in the 3rd century as living north and east of the Lower Rhine River....
. In the 11th century it became a possession of Boniface of Canossa, marquis

Marquess

A marquess or marquis is a nobleman of hereditary rank in various European monarchies and some of their colonies. The term is also used to render equivalent oriental styles as in imperial China and Japan....
of Toscana. The last ruler of the family was the countess Matilda of Canossa

Matilda of Tuscany

Matilda of Canossa , called la Gran Contessa or the Great Countess, was an italy noblewoman, the principal Italian supporter of Pope Gregory VII during the Investiture Controversy....
(d. 1115), who, according to legend, ordered the construction of the precious Rotonda di San Lorenzo

Rotonda di San Lorenzo

The Rotonda di San Lorenzo is a religious building in Mantua, Lombardy .It is the most ancient church in the city, having been built during the reign of the Boniface of Canossa family in the late 11th century....
(1082).

After the death of Matilde of Canossa, Mantua became a free

Free Imperial City

In the Holy Roman Empire, a free imperial city was a city formally ruled by the emperor only — as opposed to the majority of cities in the Empire, which belonged to a List of states in the Holy Roman Empire and so were governed by one of the many princes of the Empire, such as dukes or prince-bishops....
commune

Medieval commune

Communes in Europe during the Middle Ages were sworn allegiances of mutual defense among the citizens of a town or city. They took many forms, and varied widely in organization and makeup....
, and strenuously defended itself from the Holy Roman Empire

Holy Roman Empire

The Holy Roman Empire was a union of territories in Central Europe during the Middle Ages and the Early modern Europe under a Holy Roman Emperor....
in the 12th and 13th centuries. In 1198 Alberto Pitentino optimised the course of the Mincio, creating what Mantuans call "the four lakes" to reinforce the city's natural protection. Between 1215 and 1216 the city was under the podesteria
Podestà

Podest? is the name given to certain high officials in many Italy cities, since the later Middle Ages, mainly as Chief magistrate of a city state , but also as a local administrator, the representative of the Emperor....
of the Guelph

Guelph

Guelph is a city in Ontario, Canada.Guelph may also refer to:* Guelph , consisting of the City of Guelph, Ontario* Guelph , as the above...
Rambertino Buvalelli

Rambertino Buvalelli

Rambertino di Guido Buvalelli , a Bologna judge, statesman, diplomat, and poet, was the earliest of the podest?-troubadours of thirteenth-century Lombardy....
.

During the struggle between the Guelphs and the Ghibellines, Pinamonte Bonacolsi took advantage of the chaotic situation to seize power in 1273. His family ruled Mantua for the next century, making it more prosperous and artistically beautiful. On August 16, 1328, the last Bonacolsi, Rinaldo, was overthrown in a revolt backed by the House of Gonzaga

House of Gonzaga

The Gonzaga family ruled Mantua in Northern Italy from 1328 to 1708. See Duchy of Mantua for a list of rulers.In 1433, Gianfrancesco I Gonzaga assumed the title of Marquis of Mantua, and in 1530 Federico II of Gonzaga received the title of Duke of Mantua....
, a family of officials. Luigi Gonzaga, who had been podestà

Podestà

Podest? is the name given to certain high officials in many Italy cities, since the later Middle Ages, mainly as Chief magistrate of a city state , but also as a local administrator, the representative of the Emperor....
of the city in 1318, was elected "People's Captain". The Gonzaga built new walls with five gates and renovated the architecture of the city in the 14th century, but the political situation in the city did not settle until the third Gonzaga, Ludovico I Gonzaga, eliminated his relatives, seizing power for himself.

Through a payment of 120,000 golden florins

Italian coin florin

The Italy florin was a coin struck from 1252 to 1523 with no significant change in its design or metal content standard. It had 54 grain of gold ....
in 1433, Gianfrancesco I was appointed marquis of Mantua by Emperor Sigismund, whose daughter Barbara of Brandenburg

Brandenburg

Brandenburg is one of the sixteen states of Germany of Germany. It lies in the east of the country and is one of the new federal states that were re-created in 1990 upon the reunification of the former West Germany and East Germany....
he married. In 1459 Pope Pius II

Pope Pius II

Pope Pius II, born Enea Silvio Piccolomini was Pope from August 19, 1458 until his death in 1464. Pius II, "whose character reflects almost every tendency of the age in which he lived", was born at Corsignano in the Siena territory of a noble but decayed family....
held a diet in Mantua to proclaim a crusade against the Turks

Ottoman Empire

The Ottoman Empire , also known by its contemporaries as the Turkish Empire or Turkey , was an empire that lasted from 1299?1923. It was Treaty of Lausanne by the Republic of Turkey, which was officially proclaimed on October 29, 1923....
. Under Francesco II the famous Renaissance

Renaissance

The Renaissance was a cultural movement that spanned roughly the 14th to the 17th century, beginning in Italy in the late Middle Ages and later spreading to the rest of Europe....
painter Andrea Mantegna

Andrea Mantegna

Andrea Mantegna was a Venetian Renaissance artist, a student of Ancient Rome archeology, and son in law of Jacopo Bellini. Like other artists of the time, Mantegna experimented with Perspective , e.g., by lowering the horizon in order to create a sense of greater monumentality....
worked in Mantua as court painter, producing some of his most outstanding works.

The first duke of Mantova was Federico II Gonzaga, who acquired the title from Emperor Charles V in 1530. Federico commissioned Giulio Romano

Giulio Romano

Giulio Romano was an Italy Painting and Architecture. A prominent pupil of Raffaello Santi, his stylistic deviations from high Renaissance classicism help define the 16th-century style known as Mannerism....
to build the famous Palazzo Te, on the periphery of the city, and profoundly improved the urbanistic asset of the city. About Mantua, the poet Torquato Tasso

Torquato Tasso

Torquato Tasso was an Italy poet of the 16th century, best known for his poem La Gerusalemme liberata , in which he depicts a highly imaginative version of the combats between Christians and Muslims at the end of the First Crusade, during the siege of Jerusalem ....
in 1586 wrote:

This is a very beautiful city and one worth travelling a thousand miles to see.

In 1624 Francesco IV moved the ducal seat to a new residence, the Villa della Favorita, designed by the architect Nicolò Sebregondi.

In 1627, the direct line of the Gonzaga family came to an end with the vicious and weak Vincenzo II, and the town slowly declined under the new rulers, the Gonzaga-Nevers

Nevers

Nevers is a Communes of France in the Ni?vre Departments of France in central France.It is the principal city of the former Provinces of France of Nivernais....
, a cadet French

France

France , officially the French Republic , is a country whose Metropolitan France is located in Western Europe and that also comprises various Overseas departments and territories of France....
branch of the family. The War of the Mantuan Succession

War of the Mantuan Succession

The War of the Mantuan Succession was a peripheral part of the Thirty Years' War. Its casus belli was the extinction of the direct male line of the House of Gonzaga in December 1627....
broke out, and in 1630 an Imperial

Holy Roman Empire

The Holy Roman Empire was a union of territories in Central Europe during the Middle Ages and the Early modern Europe under a Holy Roman Emperor....
army of 36,000 Landsknecht

Landsknecht

Landsknechts were European, most often Germany, mercenary pikeman and supporting infantrys from the late 15th to the late 16th century, and achieved the reputation for being the universal mercenary of the European Renaissance....
mercenaries besieged Mantua, bringing the plague with them. Mantua never recovered from this disaster. Ferdinand Carlo IV

Charles IV, Duke of Mantua

Charles IV, Duke of Mantua was the only child of Duke Charles III, Duke of Mantua of Mantua and Montferrat, and the last ruler of the Duchy of Mantua of the House of Gonzaga....
, an inept ruler whose only aim was to hold parties and theatrical representations, allied with France

France

France , officially the French Republic , is a country whose Metropolitan France is located in Western Europe and that also comprises various Overseas departments and territories of France....
in the Spanish Succession War. After the latter's defeat, he took refuge in Venice

Venice

Venice is a city in northern Italy, the capital city of the Italian regions Veneto, a population of 271,251 . Together with Padua, Italy, the city is included in the Padua-Venice Metropolitan Area ....
, carrying with him a thousand pictures. At his death, in 1708, he was declared deposed and his family lost Mantua forever in favour of the Habsburg

Habsburg

The House of Habsburg was an important royal house of Europe and is best known as supplying all of the formally elected Holy Roman Emperors between 1452 and 1740, as well as rulers of Spanish Empire and the Austrian Empire....
s of Austria

Austria

Austria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country in Central Europe. It borders both Germany and the Czech Republic to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the west....
.

Under Austrian rule, Mantua enjoyed a revival, and during this period the Royal Academy of Sciences, Letters and Arts, the Scientific Theatre, and numerous Palaces were built.

On June 4 1796, during the Napoleonic Wars

Napoleonic Wars

The Napoleonic Wars were a series of conflicts involving Napoleon I of France First French Empire and changing sets of European allies and opposing coalitions that ran from 1803 to 1815....
, Mantua was besieged by Napoleon as a move against Austria, who joined the First Coalition

First Coalition

The First Coalition was the first major concerted effort of multiple European power s to contain French First Republic. It took shape after the French Revolutionary Wars had already begun....
. Austrian and Russian attempts to break the siege failed, but spread the French thin enough to abandon the siege on 31 July to fight other battles. The siege resumed on August 24. In early February the city surrendered and the region came under French administration. Two years later, in 1799, the city was retaken

Siege of Mantua (1799)

The Siege of Mantua was a four-month effort by the Habsburg Monarchy army to regain a presence in northern Italy after being excluded from that region by Napoleon I of France through the successful French First Republic Siege of Mantua in 1797....
by the Austrians.

Later, the city was again passed to Napoleon's control. In the year 1810 by Porta Giulia, a gate of the town at Borgo di Porto (Cittadella), Andreas Hofer

Andreas Hofer

File:Andreas Hofer 01.jpgAndreas Hofer was a German Tyrol ean innkeeper and Patriotism. He was the leader of a rebellion against Napoleon I of France's forces....
was shot; he had led the insurrection of the Tyrol

Tirol, Italy

Tirol is a comune in the province of Province of Bolzano-Bozen in the Italy region Trentino-Alto Adige/S?dtirol, located about 70 km north of the city of Trento and about 25 km northwest of the city of Bolzano....
against Napoleon.

After the brief French rule, Mantua returned to Austria in 1814, becoming one of the Quadrilatero

Quadrilatero

The Quadrilatero is the traditional name of a defensive system of the Austrian Empire in the Lombardy-Venetia, which connected the fortresses of Peschiera del Garda, Mantua, Legnago and Verona between the Mincio, the Po River and Adige Rivers....
fortress cities in northern Italy. Agitation against Austria culminated in a revolt which lasted from 1851 to 1855, and was finally suppressed by the Austrian army. One of the most famous episodes of Italian Risorgimento took place in the small valley of Belfiore, when a group of rebels was hanged by the Austrians.

In 1866, Mantua was incorporated in united Italy

Italian unification

Italian Unification was the political and social movement that annexed different states of the Italian peninsula into the single state of Italy in the 19th century....
by the king of Sardinia

Kingdom of Sardinia

Kingdom of Sardinia, also known as Piedmont-Sardinia or Sardinia-Piedmont, was the name given to the possessions of the House of Savoy in 1720, when the island of Sardinia was awarded by the Treaty of London to Victor Amadeus II of Sardinia to compensate him for the loss of Sicily to Austrian Empire....
.

See also:

Duchy of Mantua
Duchy of Mantua

The Duchy of Mantua was a duchy in Lombardy, Northern Italy, subject to the Holy Roman Empire....
.

Main sights

The Gonzaga protected art and culture, and hosted several important artists like Leone Battista Alberti

Leone Battista Alberti

Leon Battista Alberti was an Italy author, artist, architect, poet, Catholic_priest, linguistics, philosopher, and cryptography, and general Renaissance humanist polymath....
, Andrea Mantegna

Andrea Mantegna

Giulio Romano

Donatello

Donatello was a famous early Renaissance Italy artist and sculpture from Florence. He is, in part, known for his work in bas-relief, a form of shallow relief sculpture that, in Donatello's case, incorporated significant 15th-century developments in perspectival illusionism....
, Peter Paul Rubens

Peter Paul Rubens

Peter Paul Rubens was a prolific seventeenth-century Flemish Baroque painter, and a proponent of an exuberant Baroque style that emphasized movement, color, and sensuality....
, Pisanello

Pisanello

Pisanello , known professionally as Antonio di Puccio Pisano or Antonio di Puccio da Cereto, also erroneously called Vittore Pisano by Giorgio Vasari, was one of the most distinguished painters of the early Italian Renaissance and Quattrocento....
, Domenico Fetti

Domenico Fetti

Domenico Fetti was an Italy Baroque painter active mainly in Rome, Mantua and Venice....
, Luca Fancelli

Luca Fancelli

Luca Fancelli was an Italy architect and sculpture....
and Nicolò Sebregondi. Though many of the masterworks have been dispersed, the cultural value of Mantua is nonetheless outstanding. Many monuments furnish examples of unique patrimony in patrician buildings and Italian architecture.

Main monuments include:

The Palazzo Te (1525-1535), a creation of Giulio Romano
Giulio Romano

Giulio Romano was an Italy Painting and Architecture. A prominent pupil of Raffaello Santi, his stylistic deviations from high Renaissance classicism help define the 16th-century style known as Mannerism....
(who lived in Mantua in his final years) in the style of mature Renaissance
Renaissance

The Renaissance was a cultural movement that spanned roughly the 14th to the 17th century, beginning in Italy in the late Middle Ages and later spreading to the rest of Europe....
and with some hints of a certain post-Raphaelian mannerism
Mannerism

Mannerism is a Art periods of European art which emerged from the later years of the Italian High Renaissance around 1520. It lasted until about 1580 in Italy, when a more Baroque style began to replace it, but continued into the seventeenth century throughout much of Europe....
. It was the summer residential villa of Frederick II of Gonzaga. It hosts the Museo Civico (with the donations of Arnoldo Mondadori
Arnoldo Mondadori

Arnoldo Mondadori was a noted Italy publisher.Mondadori was born at Poggio Rusco, Mantua and died in Milan.His publishing house is today the largest in Italy....
, one of the most important Italian publishers, and Ugo Sissa, a Mantuan architect who worked in Iraq
Iraq

Iraq , officially the Republic of Iraq , is a country in Western Asia spanning most of the northwestern end of the Zagros Mountains, the eastern part of the Syrian Desert and the northern part of the Arabian Desert....
from where he brought back important Mesopotamia
Mesopotamia

Mesopotamia is the area of the Tigris-Euphrates river system, along the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, largely corresponding to modern Iraq, as well as some parts of northeastern Syria, some parts of southeastern Turkey, and some parts of the Khuzestan Province of southwestern Iran....
n artworks)
The Palazzo Ducale
Palazzo Ducale di Mantova

The Palazzo Ducale di Mantova is a group of buildings in the Italian city of Mantua , built between the 14th and the 17th century mainly by the noble family of House of Gonzaga as their royal residence in the capital of their Duchy of Mantua....
, famous residence of the Gonzaga family, made up by a number of buildings, courtyards and gardens gathered around the Palazzo del Capitano, the Magna Domus, and the Castle of St. George.
The Basilica of Sant'Andrea
Basilica di Sant'Andrea di Mantova

The Basilica di Sant'Andrea is a Renaissance church in Mantua, Lombardy .Commissioned by Ludovico II Gonzaga, the church was begun in 1462 according to designs by Leon Battista Alberti on a site occupied by a Benedictine monastery, of which the bell tower remains....
The Duomo
The Rotonda di San Lorenzo
Rotonda di San Lorenzo

The Rotonda di San Lorenzo is a religious building in Mantua, Lombardy .It is the most ancient church in the city, having been built during the reign of the Boniface of Canossa family in the late 11th century....
The Bibiena Theater
The church of San Sebastiano
The Palazzo Vescovile ("Bishops Palace")
The Palazzo degli Uberti
The Torre della Gabbia ("Cage Tower")
The Palazzo del Podestà that hosts the museum of Tazio Nuvolari
Tazio Nuvolari

Tazio Giorgio Nuvolari was an Italy motorcycle and racecar auto racing, known as Il Mantovano Volante or Nivola. He was the 1932 European Championship in Grand Prix motor racing....
The Palazzo della Ragione with the Torre dell'Orologio ("Clock Tower")
The Palazzo Bonacolsi

Gallery

Transportation

Mantua lies across the Milan-Codogno

Codogno

Codogno is a town in the province of Lodi, Lombardy, Italy....
-Cremona

Cremona

Cremona is a city in northern Italy, situated in Lombardy, on the left shore of the Po River in the middle of the Pianura Padana . It is the capital of the province of Cremona and the seat of the local City and Province governments....
-Mantova. By car, it can be reached through the A4 (Milan-Venice) Highway to Verona

Verona

Verona is a city in Veneto, northern Italy, one of the seven provincial capitals in the region. It is one of the main tourist destinations in north-eastern Italy, thanks to its artistic heritage, several annual fairs, shows and operas, such as the lyrical season in the Arena, the ancient amphitheatre built by the Romans....
, and from there Highway A22 (Brennero-Modena). Otherwise, through the State road 415 (Milan-Cremona) to Cremona, and from there State road 10 (Cremona-Mantova).

The closest airport is Verona-Villafranca.

Other

An annual survey of Legambiente (an ecologist movement of Italy) in 2005 declared Mantua the most liveable city of the country. The study was based on levels of pollution, quality of life, traffic of cars, and public transportation, among other criteria.
The body of Saint Longinus, twice recovered and lost, was asserted to have been found once more at Mantua in 1304, together with the Holy Sponge stained with Christ's blood.
In William Shakespeare's play Romeo and Juliet
Romeo and Juliet

Romeo and Juliet is a Shakespearean tragedy written early in the career of playwright William Shakespeare about two young "Star-crossed" whose untimely deaths ultimately unite their feuding families....
, Romeo spends his period of exile – his punishment for killing Tybalt
Tybalt

Tybalt is a fictional character in William Shakespeare's play Romeo and Juliet. He is Juliet's hateful cousin and Romeo's rival....
– in Mantua. Also, in his play Taming of the Shrew, the schoolmaster who pretends to be Lucentio’s father, Vincentio, is from this city.
Giuseppe Verdi
Giuseppe Verdi

Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi was an Italian Romantic music composer, mainly of opera. He was one of the most influential composers in the 19th century....
's opera
Opera

Opera is an Performing arts in which singers and musicians perform a dramatic work which combines a text and a musical score. Opera is part of the Western classical music tradition....
Rigoletto
Rigoletto

Rigoletto is an opera in three acts by Giuseppe Verdi. The Italian language libretto was written by Francesco Maria Piave based on the play Le roi s'amuse by Victor Hugo....
(Based on Victor Hugo
Victor Hugo

Victor-Marie Hugo was a France poet, playwright, novelist, essayist, visual artist, statesman, human rights activist and exponent of the Romanticism movement in France....
's play Le roi s'amuse
Le roi s'amuse

Le roi s'amuse is a play written by Victor Hugo in 1832. While it depicts the escapades of Francis I of France, censors of the time believed that it also contained insulting references to King Louis-Philippe and banned it after one performance....
) is set in Mantua. Austro-Hungarian authorities in Venice
Venice

Venice is a city in northern Italy, the capital city of the Italian regions Veneto, a population of 271,251 . Together with Padua, Italy, the city is included in the Padua-Venice Metropolitan Area ....
forced him to move the action from France
France

France , officially the French Republic , is a country whose Metropolitan France is located in Western Europe and that also comprises various Overseas departments and territories of France....
to Mantua.
Since 1997 Mantua has hosted the Festivaletteratura
Festivaletteratura

Festivaletteratura is a literary fair, held in Mantua, Italy, since 1997. Its peculiar formula is to host five days of small-sized lectures by authors from all over the world....
, one of the most renowned literary events in Europe.
In 2007 the remains of two people were discovered during the construction of a factory. The remains are thought to be between 5,000 and 6,000 years old. It is speculated that the remains are of two young lovers because the two skeletons appear to be embracing.

Twin cities

Azuchi, Shiga
Azuchi, Shiga

is a towns of Japan located in Gamo District, Shiga, Shiga Prefecture, Japan.As of 2003, the town has an estimated population of 12,217 and a population density of 502.76 persons per km?....
, Japan
Japan

Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, People's Republic of China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south....
Madison
Madison, Wisconsin

Madison is the List of U.S. state capitals of the U.S. state of Wisconsin and the county seat of Dane County, Wisconsin. It is also home to the University of Wisconsin–Madison....
, USA
United States

The United States of America is a Federal government constitutional republic comprising U.S. state and a federal district. The country is situated mostly in central North America, where its Contiguous United States and Washington, D.C., the Capital districts and territories, lie between the Pacific Ocean and Atlantic Oceans, Borders of the U...
Charleville-Mézières
Charleville-Mézières

Charleville-M?zi?res is a Communes of France in northern France, capital of the Ardennes Departments of France in the Champagne-Ardenne Regions of France....
, France
France

France , officially the French Republic , is a country whose Metropolitan France is located in Western Europe and that also comprises various Overseas departments and territories of France....
Nevers
Nevers

Nevers is a Communes of France in the Ni?vre Departments of France in central France.It is the principal city of the former Provinces of France of Nivernais....
, France
France

France , officially the French Republic , is a country whose Metropolitan France is located in Western Europe and that also comprises various Overseas departments and territories of France....
Weingarten
Weingarten (Württemberg)

Weingarten is a town with a population of 24,000 in W?rttemberg, in the Ravensburg , in the valley of the Schussen River. Together with the southern neighbour cities of Ravensburg and Friedrichshafen on Lake Constance , it forms one of 14 medium-sized infrastructural centres in Baden-W?rttemberg....
, Germany
Germany

Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a country in Central Europe. It is bordered to the north by the North Sea, Denmark, and the Baltic Sea; to the east by Poland and the Czech Republic; to the south by Austria and Switzerland; and to the west by France, Luxembourg, Belgium, and the Netherlands....
Hyderabad, India
India

India, officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and outlying territories by total area country by geographical area, the List of countries by population country, and the most populous liberal democracy in the world....

Famous citizens

Publius Vergilius Maro, known in English as Virgil
Virgil

Publius Vergilius Maro was a classical Roman poet, best known for three major works?the Bucolics , the Georgics and the Aeneid?although several Appendix Vergiliana are also attributed to him....
(70 BCE – 19 BCE)), a classical Roman poet.
Sordello
Sordello

Sordello da Goito or Sordel de Goit was a 13th-century Lombardy troubadour, born in the municipality of Goito in the province of Mantua. He is perhaps best remembered for the praise heaped on him by other poets: he is praised by Dante Alighieri in the De vulgari eloquentia, and in the Purgatorio of The Divine Comedy is mad...
or Sordel, a 13th-century Lombard
Lombardy

Lombardy is one of the 20 regions of Italy. The capital is Milan. One-sixth of Italy's population lives in Lombardy and about one fifth of Italy's GDP is produced in this region....
troubadour
Troubadour

A troubadour was a composer and performer of Occitan lyric poetry during the High Middle Ages .The troubadour school or tradition began in the eleventh century in Occitania, but it subsequently spread into Italy, Spain, and even Greece....
, born in the municipality of Goito
Goito

Goito is a comune of Lombardy, Italy, in the Province of Mantua, from which it is 11 miles NW, on the road to Brescia. It is situated on the right bank of the Mincio River near the bridge....
in the province of Mantua
Mantua

Mantua is a city in Lombardy, Italy and capital of the Province of Mantua of the same name.Mantua is surrounded on three sides by artificial lakes created during the 12th century....
Pietro Pomponazzi
Pietro Pomponazzi

Pietro Pomponazzi was an Italy philosopher. He is sometimes known by his Latin language name, Petrus Pomponatius.Pomponazzi was born in Mantua and began his education there....
(1462–1525), an Italian philosopher. He is sometimes known by his Latin name, Petrus Pomponatius.
Giovanni Battista Bertani
Giovanni Battista Bertani

Giovanni Battista Bertani was an Italy painter of the Renaissance period. He trained with Giulio Romano in Mantua. His brother Domenico Bertani also painted in Mantua. He was active in 1568....
(1516–1576), architect.
Leone de' Sommi
Leone de' Sommi

Leone de' Sommi was born in c. 1525, and lived most of his life in the northern Italy city of Mantua, until his death in c. 1590. He had the fortune to live at Mantua during the apogee of its Renaissance cultural flowering, under the rule of the House of Gonzaga dynasty....
(Yehuda ben Yitzchak Somi Misha'ar Aryeh) (c. 1525 – c. 1590), theater director and writer.

Giuseppe Sarto (1835-1914), appointed Bishop
Bishop

A bishop is an ordination or consecration member of the Clergy#Christian clergy who is generally entrusted with a position of authority and oversight....
in 1884 before he became Pope Pius X in 1903.
Dave Rodgers
Dave Rodgers

Dave Rodgers is an Italian people songwriter, composer, and producer.Born in Mantua, he started production with the band Aleph . Since then, he has collaborated with artists from around the world and has produced several multi-platinum albums....
, Eurobeat
Eurobeat

Eurobeat, as the name implies, is a music genre from Europe. It is a sub-genre of 80s italo disco . In the USA, it was sometimes marketed as Hi-NRG and for a short while shared this term with the very early freestyle music hits....
artist and producer
Alberto Jori
Alberto Jori

Alberto Jori is an Italy Neo-Aristotelian philosopher.Born in Mantua, he studied in Padua, Cambridge and Heidelberg. In 2003 he won with his book on Aristotle the Prize of the Acad?mie Internationale d'Histoire des Sciences - International Academy of the History of Science ....
, neo-aristotelian philosopher.
Tazio Nuvolari
Tazio Nuvolari

Tazio Giorgio Nuvolari was an Italy motorcycle and racecar auto racing, known as Il Mantovano Volante or Nivola. He was the 1932 European Championship in Grand Prix motor racing....
, said to be one of the best racing drivers of the first half of the 20th Century.

Romeo from Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet (temporarily during Scene V)

External links

(in Italian)
To know and to see Mantua
(IT) description by Arthur Rubinstein Association Italy