Padua

Extensively reconstructed after the damage caused by bombing in World War II, and hemmed in by the sprawl that has accompanied its development as the economic capital of the Veneto region, Padua is one of the most important Art Cities in Italy. A large student population creates a young, vibrant atmosphere and the city has undoubtedly the best nightlife within reach of Venice. As a result, more and more people use Padua as a base from which to make day-trips to its overcrowded neighbour.

Padua is an ancient city, and plentiful evidence remains of its impressive lineage. In the 4th century B.C. it rose from a fishing village to become the most important centre of the Veneto people. Allied with the Romans against the Gauls, it became a Roman Municipium in 45 B.C. and reached a high degree of economic prosperity and great urban development under Augustus. The city thrived until the barbarian onslaughts whence Padua suffered a mortal blow when the Longobards set fire to it in 602. Recovery was quite slow, but by the middle of the twelfth century, when it became a free commune, the city was prosperous once again. The University was founded in 1222; it was the second oldest in Italy and attracted teachers and scholars from all over Europe. Both Dante and Petrarch worked and lived in Padua. A decade later the city became a place of sacred pilgrimage following the death here of St Anthony.

By the second half of the following century (after the parenthesis of the reign of Ezzelino da Romano) the city was spreading its influence well beyond the Communal territory, clashing with the emperor, Arrigo VII, and with the La Scala family (1311-1329). During these long wars, the Da Carrara family came to the fore and was granted seigneury of the town (1338-1405). During the thirteenth century and for the whole of the fourteenth century the city went through a period of great cultural and artistic fervour. The first circle of stonewalls was built around the city, followed by the Palazzo della Ragione, the Basilica of St. Anthony and the Church of the Eremitani.

The artistic scene was dominated by Giotto, whose masterpiece is the decoration of the Scrovegni Chapel (1303-1305). Artists such as Guariento, Altichiero and Giusto followed in the wake of the master, creating cycles of frescoes of unparalleled artistry.

The enlightened seigneury of the Da Carrara family came to an end in 1405; Padua fell under the dominion of Venice, whose fate it shared until the end. Padua remained a leader in the artistic field at least till the mid fifteenth century, thanks to the presence of Donatello and Mantegna.

Padua continued its renewal in the sixteenth century: the new circle of fortified walls was built; the new Town Hall, the Palazzo del Capitanio, the imposing Basilica of S. Giustina and the new Cathedral were also built. The University too knew a period of great splendour, with the Botanic Garden and the Anatomy theatre, the new Palazzo del Bo, where Galileo Galilei taught. During the following three centuries Padua underwent a slow economic decline, reflected in the modesty of private and public buildings. The last great piece of town planning was the rearrangement of Prato della Valle (1775).

After the fall of Venice (1797) and the period of Napoleonic rule (Napoleon slept in the city’s centre during his conquests), Padua passed into Austrian hands (1813) and this situation continued until 1866 when the town was annexed to the kingdom of Italy. Starting from the early years of the twentieth century, a new period of economic growth began, thanks to the development of industry, trade and tertiary services; this trend was strengthened in the period between the two wars and accelerated even more during the last thirty years, thus making Padua the most important managerial pole in Northeast Italy.

The Province has a vast but little-known cultural and artistic heritage with great natural assets. One has only to think of the Euganean Hills' rich flora and vineyards, of the countless villas and castles scattered all over the area, of the monasteries and churches built by the monastic orders, real treasure-troves of artistic works, of the mediaeval walled towns (Cittadella, Este, Monselice, Montagnana ), of the network of rivers, streams and canals, and of course-- of the many picturesque old farmhouses.

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The University & City Centre Squares (‘Piazza’)

The area north and west of the university forms the hub of the city.

Via Umberto I leads up towards the university, the main block of which is the Palazzo del Bò (“The Ox” – named after an inn that used to stand here). Established in September 1221, the University of Padua is older than any other in Italy except that of Bologna, and the coats of arms which encrust the courtyard and Great Hall attest to the social and intellectual rank of its alumni. The first permanent anatomy theatre was built here in 1594, where dissections of human corpses would take place in secret as a result of laws passed by the Pope regarding the ‘experimentation’ on the deceased. The dissection tables were located in laboratories situated above canals to the city’s river. When inspecting officials would come to check the various facilities, the professors would simply pull a lever that would slightly incline the operating table that would send the corpse to an awaiting boat below. They would then replace the human corpse with that of an animal. This must have been a facility that greatly helped William Harvey, who went on to develop the theory of blood circulation after taking his degree here in 1602. Galileo taught physics here from 1592 to 1610, declaiming from a lectern that is still on show. And in 1678 Elena Lucrezia Corner Piscopia became the first woman to collect a university degree when she was awarded her doctorate in philosophy here – there's a statue of her in the courtyard. Throughout the year, in this area and throughout the city’s centre, you can observe the traditional hazing of the university graduates as they are forced to dress up in ridiculous costumes and recite personally patronising speeches written by their fellow students, all supervised in parade-like manner by supportive family and friends. The Bò is only open for guided visits, which should be booked in advance.

March–Oct Mon, Wed & Fri 3pm & 4pm, Tues, Thurs & Sat 10am & 11am; €2.58; tel 049.820.9773.

A little way up from the university, on the left, is the Caffè Pedrocchi, a complex building in neoclassical style with a flourish of ornate Gothic, designed by Giuseppe Jappelli (1831). Original and rare example of a multipurpose premises, designed to be a cafè on the ground floor while the upstairs rooms, decorated in variuous styles, were intended as meeting and concert halls. It used to be the city's main intellectual salon; it's no longer that. Now it caters to tourists who want to spend exorbant prices for drinks and ice cream in order to lounge on its premises. However at night, it transforms into a chic café during selected ‘Jazz performance evenings’.

The Caffetteria on the groundfloor is open Tue-Sun 7am-8pm. The upper floor is open Tue-Sun 9.30-12.30 15.30-18.30

The Piazza della Frutta and Piazza dell' Erbe, the sites of Padua's daily markets, are two picturesque squares, seats of the local daily market. Nearby is Piazza dei Signori, where you can admire the Loggia della Gran Guardia (1496-1553) and the Clock Tower (1423). All three squares are lined by bars, restaurants and shops where you can just sit and relax.

Separating these squares is one of the most remarkable buildings in northern Italy, the Palazzo della Ragione or ‘Il Salone’. It sits in the marketplace, ringed with loggias and a roof shaped like the hull of a sailing vessel. At the time of its construction in 1218, this vast hall was the largest room to have been built on top of another storey. Its decoration would once have been as astounding as its size, but the original frescoes by Giotto and his assistants were destroyed by fire in 1420, though some by Giustio de'Menabuoi have survived; most of the extant frescoes are by Nicola Miretto (1425–40) depicting an astrological calendar distinctively Medieval in its complexity.

Mainly used as the city council's assembly hall, it was built by the Commune of Padua as the seat of the Podestà and the Law Courts; the place where Padua's citizens could plead for justice – hence the appellation della Ragione, meaning "of reason".

Climb the steps and you enter the grandiose Salone, an 82m (270-ft.) assembly hall containing an unmissable, gigantic 15th-century wooden horse with disproportionately gigantic gonads, modelled on Donatello's Gattamelata, made for a joust in 1466.

Hours Tues-Sun 9am-7pm Location Via VIII Febbraio, between Piazza delle Erbe and Piazza dell Frutta Transportation Bus: 8 or A Phone 049-8205006 Prices Admission included with entry to Cappella degli Scrovegni and to the Civil Museum; separate visit 5€.

Prato della Valle
Once a roman theatre, this vast square is the largest in all of Europe (second in the world only to Red Square in Russia). It has become the traditional site for fairs and amusements in the city. It is a large elliptical green island, divided by four avenues corresponding to four bridges, surrounded by a canal along which stand 78 statues of famous men from Padua’s history.

Churches & Museums

The Scrovegni Chapel

For many people the Giotto frescoes in the Scrovegni, considered to be one of the key works in the development of European art, are the reason for coming to Padua. The collection is a masterpiece in the history of painting in Italy and Europe from the 14th century and is considered to be the most complete series of frescoes executed by Giotto in his mature age. Colour and light, poetry and pathos. Man and God. The sense of nature and history, humanity and faith are mingled in narrating the stories of the Virgin Mary and Christ in a unique way.
Giotto completed the frescoes in the Chapel at the beginning of 1305.
At that time: "…the chapel presents very simple architecture: a rectangular hall with a barrel vault, an elegant gothic triple lancet window on the façade, tall, narrow windows on the southern
wall, and a polygonal apse, later raised to contain the belfry".

The Scrovegni Chapel, dedicated to St. Mary of the Charity, frescoed between 1303 and 1305 by Giotto, was commissioned in 1303 by Enrico Scrovegni in atonement for his father's usury, which was so vicious that he was denied a Christian burial. As soon as the walls were built, Giotto was commissioned to cover them with illustrations of the life of Mary, the life of Jesus and the story of the Passion; the finished cycle, arranged in three tightly-knit tiers and painted against a backdrop of saturated blue (now famously described as “Giotto Blue”), is one of the most important masterpieces in the development of Western art. On the wall opposite the altar is the grandiose Universal Judgement, which concludes the story of human salvation. This cycle of more than 35 frescoes, which, along with those at Assisi, form the basis of his claim to fame. Like an illustrated storybook, the frescoes unfold biblical scenes. The third bottom panel (the lower level on the right) is most often reproduced; it depicts Judas kissing a most skeptical Christ. On the entrance wall is Giotto's Last Judgment, in which hell wins out for sheer fascination. The master's representation of the Vices and Virtues is bizarre; it reveals the depth of his imagination in personifying nebulous evil and elusive good. One of the most dramatic panels depicts the raising of Lazarus from the dead -- a masterfully balanced scene, rhythmically ingenious for its day. The swathed and cadaverous Lazarus, however, looks indecisive on whether he'll rejoin the living.

The Scrovegni series is a marvellous demonstration of Giotto's innovative attention to the inner nature of his subjects. In terms of sheer physical presence and the relationships between the figures and their environment, Giotto's work takes the first important strides towards realism and humanism. For example, the Joachim series on the top row of the north wall (on your right as you walk in) is particularly powerful – note the exchange of looks between the two shepherds in the Arrival of Joachim. Beneath the main pictures are shown the vices and virtues in human (usually female) form, while on the wall above the door is a Last Judgement – in rather poor condition and now thought to be only partly by Giotto – with rivers of fire leading from God to hell. Directly above the door is a portrait of Scrovegni presenting the chapel; his tomb is at the far end, behind the altar with its statues (The Virgin) by the Tuscan sculptor Giovanni Pisano.

The chapel was originally attached to the Scrovegni family palace, built after 1300, following the elliptical outline of the remains of the antique Roman arena (the white block stoned remains of which are still standing in the park).
The Chapel was acquired by the City of Padova in1880, and the vulnerable frescoes were subjected to several specialized restoration operations during the 19th and 20th centuries. From the 1970s until today, thanks to close collaboration between the city administration, cultural heritage authorities and the Istituto Centrale per il Restauro, the state of the building, the quality of the air in it, polluting factors, and the state of conservation of the frescoes themselves have all been subjected to careful study and monitoring. The addition of the new access building, with its special air-conditioned waiting-room, means that even great influxes of visitors can enter the Chapel and admire Giotto’s masterpiece without further jeopardizing its fragile condition in any way.
The latest checks, which show that the condition of the frescoes is now stable, have allowed them to be restored further - delicate operations undertaken by the Istituto Centrale per il Restauro - thanks to an agreement between the City of Padova and the Italian Ministero per i Beni e le Attività Culturali.

The frescoes follow three main themes :
1) episodes in the lives of Joachim and Anna (1-6)
2) episodes in the Virgin Mary's life (7-13)
3) episodes recounting Christ's life and death
The lower parts of the walls contain a series of frescoes illustrating Vices and Virtues in allegory.

But even if you're no expert the chapel exerts an extraordinary presence. If anything the sense of drama has been increased by the new airlock entrance system, recently installed in an attempt to reverse the damage caused to the frescoes by high levels of humidity borne by the breath and clothing of visitors. At the time printed on your ticket, the glass door to the waiting room slides open to allow the next set of visitors in – and immediately shuts again, anyone left outside being forced to pay up and book another slot. Once inside, a high-tech system adjusts the air humidity of the waiting room down to that of the chapel itself and filters away the worst of the spores and pollution. Fourteen minutes later another door leading to the chapel itself opens and you have exactly a quarter of an hour to take in the frescoes before being ejected through a third glass door back into the grounds of the museum. Visits are restricted to a maximum of twenty-five people at a time and given the popularity of the Scrovegni it's worth booking days in advance. If you're travelling in a group, however, or at weekends during high season it's worth booking as much as a month ahead; out of season, you can usually just turn up and wait.

Compulsory bookings

Call centre: +39 049 2010020
The call centre is operative: Mondays to Fridays, 9.00 a.m. to 7.00 p.m.
Saturdays, 9.00 a.m. to 1.00 p.m.

ON-LINE BOOKING AVAILABLE 24 HOURS

On-line reservations must be made at least 24 hours in advance.

Visitors must collect their tickets 1 hour before the time assigned for entry

The Scrovegni Chapel is open from 9.00 a.m. to 7.00 p.m. all year round

Duomo & Baptistry

Padua's Duomo is quite a homely cathedral whose architect cribbed his design from drawings by Michelangelo. It didn’t help much that the city recently funded a local artist to contribute his aesthetic of modern sculpture (most notably, Christ upon the Cross, which rests on the alter) which probably would be better housed in the Museum of Modern Art in New York City. It is, however, worth peaking your head in… The adjacent Romanesque baptistry, though, is one of the unproclaimed delights of Padua. Built by the Da Carraras in the thirteenth century, and still in use today, it's lined with fourteenth-century frescoes by Giusto de'Menabuoi, a cycle which makes a fascinating comparison with Giotto's in the Cappella degli Scrovegni. The influence of Giotto is plain, but in striving for greater realism Giusto has lost Giotto's monumentality and made some of his figures awkward and unconvincing. Yet many of the scenes are delightful, and the vibrancy of their colours, coupled with the size and relative quiet of the building, make for a very memorable visit.

Duomo: Mon–Sat 7.30am–noon & 3.45–7.30pm, Sun 7.45am–1pm & 3.45–8.30pm

Baptistry: June–Sept 9.30am–1.30pm & 3–7pm; Oct–May 9.30am–1pm & 3–6pm; €1.81

Basilica of S. Anthony
This basilica was built in the 13th century and dedicated to St. Anthony of Padua, who's interred within. It's a synthesis of styles, with mainly Romanesque and Gothic features. Campaniles and minarets combine to give it an Eastern appearance. The imposing interior is richly frescoed and decorated.

Within eighteen months of his death, St Anthony had been canonized and his tomb was attracting enough pilgrims to warrant the building of the Basilica di San Antonio, or Il Santo. It was not until the start of the fourteenth century that the church reached a state that enabled the saint's body to be placed in the Cappella del Santo (in the left transept). Plastered with such votive offerings as photographs of limbs healed by the saint's supposive intervention, the shrine is irresistible to the voyeur. The chapel's more formal decoration, quite ignored by the religious and voyeuristic alike, includes the most important series of relief sculpture created in sixteenth-century Italy, a sequence of nine marble panels showing scenes from the life of St Anthony. Carved between 1505 and 1577, most have the names of their sculptors incised into the base, Antonio Lombardo, Tullio Lombardo and Jacopo Sansovino being among the most famous.

The great art treasures are the Donatello bronzes at the main altar, with a realistic Crucifix towering over the rest. Seek out as well the Donatello relief depicting the removal of Christ from the cross (at the back of the high altar), a unified composition expressing in simple lines and with an unromantic approach the tragedy of Christ and the sadness of the mourners. These are the works that introduced Renaissance classicism to Padua. There are also works by famous artists (from the 13th to the 20th century) including those of Altichiero and Giusto de'Menabuoi.

Adjoining the chapel is the Cappella della Madonna Mora (named after its fourteenth-century French altar statue), which in turn gives onto the Cappella del Beato Luca, whose fourteenth-century frescoes include a lovely image of St James lifting a prison tower to free a prisoner. Back in the aisle, just outside the Cappella del Santo, is Padua's finest work by Pietro Lombardo, the monument to Antonio Roselli (1467).

Built onto the farthest point of the ambulatory, the Cappella del Tesoro (daily 7am–1pm & 2.30–7pm) houses probably the strangest highlight of your entire visit-- the preserved tongue and vocal chords of St Anthony, on display for your perusal. A trip to Padua just wouldn’t be complete without a picture in front of the glass display. There are also a host of other lesser interesting relics about. For more on St Anthony and the basilica, enter the cloisters (on the south side of the basilica) and follow the signs for the Museo Antoniano (summer daily 9am–1pm & 2.30–6.30pm; winter Tues–Fri 10am–1pm & 2–5pm, Sat & Sun 9am–1pm & 2–5pm; €2.58), which includes the Mostra Antoniana (closes 30min earlier; free). The former, on the first floor, is a collection of paintings (including the fresco of St Anthony and St Bernardino by Mantegna), ornate incense holders, ceremonial robes and other paraphernalia linked to the basilica; the latter, on the ground floor, is a history of votive gifts.

Open daily: 6.30am-7.30pm Tel 049/8242811

Gattamelata
Apart from the encampment of stalls selling decorated candles and outsize souvenir rosaries, the main sight of the Piazza del Santo is Donatello's Monument to Gattamelata (which translates literally as "The Honeyed Cat"). as the condottiere Erasmo da Narni was known. He died in 1443 and this monument was raised ten years later, the earliest large bronze sculpture of the Renaissance. A direct precursor to Verrocchio's monument to Colleoni in Venice, it could hardly be more different: Gattemelata was known for his honesty and dignity, and Donatello has given us an image of comparative sensitivity and restraint, cleverly directing the eye to the commanding face of the Venetian military hero; quite unlike Verrocchio's image of power through force. The modelling of the horse makes a double allusion: to the equestrian statue of Marcus Aurelius in Rome, and to the horses of San Marco.

Funny, Gattamelata was a dead ringer for the late Laurence Olivier.

Located in the piazza of the Basilica of Saint Anthony

Eremitani

The church of the Eremitani, built at the turn of the fourteenth century, was almost completely wrecked by an Allied bombing raid in 1944 and has been fastidiously rebuilt. Photographs to the left of the apse show the extent of the damage, the worst aspect of which was the near-total destruction of Mantegna's frescoes of the lives of St James and St Christopher – the war's severest blow to Italy's artistic heritage.

Produced between 1454 and 1457, when Mantegna was in his mid-twenties, the frescoes were unprecedented in the thoroughness with which they exploited fixed-point perspective – a concept central to Renaissance humanism, with its emphasis on the primacy of individual perception. The extent of his achievement can now be assessed only from the fuzzy photographs and the sad fragments preserved in the chapel to the right of the high altar. On the left wall is the Martyrdom of St James, put together from fragments found in the rubble; and on the right is the Martyrdom of St Christopher, which had been removed from the wall before the war.

Open during summer: Mon–Sat 8.15am–12.15pm & 4–6pm, Sun 9.30am–12.15pm & 4–6pm; winter: Mon–Sat closes 5.30pm, Sun closes 5pm

Orto Botanico- Botanic Gardens
The world's first botanical garden was founded in 1545 by the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Padova. It still preserves its original layout - a circular central plot, symbolizing the world, surrounded by a ring of water. Other elements were added later, some architectural (ornamental entrances and balustrades) and some practical (pumping installations and greenhouses). It continues to serve its original purpose as a centre for scientific research.

The Botanical Garden of Padua is the first established of all botanical gardens throughout the world, and represents the birth of science, of scientific exchanges, and understanding of the relationship between nature and culture. It has made a profound contribution to the development of many modern scientific disciplines, notably botany, medicine, chemistry, ecology, and pharmacy.

Until 1984 the oldest plant was a Vitexagnus-castus whose presence had been acknowledged since 1550. At present, a palm (Chamaerops humilis var. arborescens) planted in 1585 is the oldest plant in the garden. It is commonly known as the “Goethe palm” since, in 1786, the famous German writer drew from a careful study of this palm his intuitions about evolution which were published in his essay about Metamorphosis of Plants.

Open during summer: daily 9-13/15-18 winter: 9-13 working days only; Tel. 049/8272127

Shopping

You'll find a wide roster of upscale consumer goods and luxury items, and less emphasis on souvenirs and handcrafts. For insights into the good life alla Padovese, trek through the neighbourhood around the landmark Piazza Insurrezione, especially the Galleria Borghese, a conglomeration of shops off Via San Fermo.

Droves of shoppers head to the Prato delle Valle on the third Sunday of every month, when more than 200 antiques and collectibles vendors set up shop for the day. The square, the largest in all Europe, also hosts a smaller weekly market on Saturday. Shoes from nearby Brenta factories are the prevalent product, but the range of goods offered remains eclectic.

The outdoor markets (Mon-Sat) in the twin Piazza delle Erbe (for fresh produce) and Piazza della Frutta (dry goods), flanking the enormous Palazzo della Ragione, are some of Italy's best.

Specialty shops include Padua's leading jewelry store at Roberto Callegari, 8 via Davila (tel. 049-8755803), and L'Antiquario Gemmologo, 6 Via Davila (tel. 049-664195), run by Callegari's brother. He sells antique silver and also has an outstanding collection of jewellery next door.

High fashion for men and woman’s clothing at MINUZZI on Riv. Ponti Romani 64/66 (tel. 049-8751384) and if you found the designer shops of Venice too pricey, you'll encounter the same merchandise at lower prices by walking along Via San Fermo, where you'll find Prada, Armani, Gucci, Hermès, Max Mara, and the like.

Just for fun, drop in at Amadio, Galleria Pedrocchi, 5 (tel. 049-8752150), which has been specializing in men's sportswear and household furnishings (an rather unusual marriage) for more than 100 years.

Dining

Antico Brolo

Across from the ornate Teatro de Padova (Civic Theater), this is the city's best restaurant. Even though the 16th-century dining room evokes the Renaissance, many patrons prefer a table in the garden, where candlelit tables are set on a terrace. The cuisine follows the tenets of most of Italy, with special emphasis on seasonal ingredients and the traditions of the Veneto and Emilia-Romagna regions. Especially delicious are the made-on-the-premises graganelli (similar to the tubular shape of penne) with garlic sauce, onion soup baked in a crust, chateaubriand with balsamic vinegar, and grilled fish. The perfect dessert is zuppa inglese, a cream-enriched equivalent to zabaglione.

Hours Tues-Sun 12:30-2:30pm and 7:30-midnight Address Corso Milano 22 Phone 049-664555

Prices Main courses 15€-25€ Season Closed Aug 10-20

Osteria Speroni

This high-end, neighbourhood fish restaurant occupies a 16th-century building , 3-minute walk from the cathedral. You'll dine in one of the three antique-looking rooms, each with exposed stone. Don't expect a lot of meat on the menu. The best way to begin is with antipasti, where you'll find fried calamari, marinated octopus, garlic-marinated shrimp, or a wide assortment of fried and marinated vegetables. A special pasta served here is the spaghetti alla busara, with shrimp, tomatoes, and lots of garlic. Also look for sea bass roasted in a salt crust. Their assortment of fine Italian wine is fantastic.

Hours Mon-Sat 12:30-2:30pm and 8-10:30pm Address Via Speroni 36 Phone 049-8753370

Prices Main courses 14€-20€ Season Closed Aug 1-25

Info.

The comprehensive ticket called Padova Arte costs € 7.75 and allows one to visit the Musei Civici (including the Cappella Scrovegni), the Palazzo della Ragione, Baptistry, Scuola del Santo, Museo Antoniano and the Orto Botanico within one year of purchase. It is available at tourist offices and the above museums and monuments.