Bologna, Leaning Towers

(3 photos)

For someone with an interest in Italian architecture, this is the city to visit. Italy is famous for leaning towers, and while the tower in Pisa is perhaps the best known, Bologna has two very prominent leaning towers. The Torre (Tower) Asinelli (built in 1109), is about 330 feet high, and leans 7 1/2 feet. The Torre Garisenda (built in 1267), was never completed, is 165 feet high and tilts 10 feet. Just look at the foundations and you can see they were purposely built on a slant so the builder could prove he could do it, and so the rich owners could say they could afford it. The street next to the towers is named Via Zamboni, the same name as the man who invented the ice-machine (called a Zamboni) used to smooth the ice at ice shows and hockey games.

Bologna is famous for its arcaded streets and dozens of towers — visible in every direction. Block after block of red-brick buildings extend over sidewalks often paved with a broken-marble mosaic. The citizens and the visitors to Bologna can walk almost endlessly in the shade and out of the rain.

Bologna’s Basilica of St. Petronius dominates Piazza Maggiore, and from the outside looks a little like an old warehouse. The lower half of the façade is faced with marble, but the upper portion remains with only rough bricks. The Basilica’s beautiful inside, with huge brick pillars, manages to look much bigger than the outside. It seems that all that huge, magnificent interior, just can’t fit inside that exterior.
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If you look at the foundation at street level, you can see this tower was built to lean. Those three shadows are of other buildings and towers behind the photographer.
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This photo shows the shadow of one tower shading the other at an angle.