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BASSANO DEL GRAPPA |
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Situated on the River Brenta where it widens on its emergence from
the hills, BASSANO has expanded rapidly this century, though its
historic centre remains largely unspoiled by twentieth-century mistakes.
It's better known for its manufacturers and produce, and for the events
of the two world wars , than for any outstanding architecture or
monuments, but the airy situation on the edge of the mountains, and the
quiet charm of the old streets make it well worth the trip. For
centuries a major producer of ceramics and wrought iron, Bassano is also
renowned for its grappa distilleries and culinary delicacies such as
porcini (dried mushrooms), white asparagus and honey.
Almost all of Bassano's sights lie between the Brenta and the train
station; go much further in either direction and you'll quickly come to
recently developed suburbs. Walking away from the station, you cross the
orbital Viale delle Fosse to get to Piazza Garibaldi , one of the two
main squares. Here, the cloister of the fourteenth-century church of San
Francesco now houses the Museo Civico (Tues-Sat 9am-6.30pm, Sun
3.30-6.30pm; L8000/4.13, ticket includes the Palazzo Sturm - , www.x-land.it/museobassano
). Downstairs the rooms are devoted to Roman and other archeological
finds. Upstairs is a collection including paintings by the da Ponte
family (better known as the Bassano family). Jacopo Bassano is the most
famous, though his works can be sentimental and derivative; his son
Francesco is better represented by some brooding portraits. Don't miss
the tucked-away medieval rooms, which conceal a couple of typically
luminous Bartolomeo Vivarini works, and a compelling Crucifixion by the
fourteenth-century Padovan artist Guariento. Other rooms are devoted to
a number of plaster works by Canova, two thousand of whose drawings are
owned by the museum, and to the great baritone Tito Gobbi, who was born
ion Bassano.
Overlooking the other side of the piazza is the Torre Civica , once a
lookout tower for the twelfth-century inner walls, now a clock tower
with spurious nineteenth-century battlements and windows. Beyond Piazza
Libertà with its fifteenth-century Loggia (once home of the Venetian
military commander), Piazzetta Montevecchio leads to a little jumble of
streets and stairways running down to the river and the Ponte degli
Alpini . The river was first bridged at this point in the late twelfth
century, and replacements or repairs have been needed at regular
intervals ever since, mostly because of flooding; the present structure
was designed by Palladio in 1568, and built of wood in order to make the
bridge as flexible as possible. Nardini, a grappa distillery founded in
1779 (Tues-Sun 8am-8pm), stands at this end of the bridge; these days
the distilling process takes place elsewhere, but there's still the
original shop and bar where you can sample before you select your
bottle.
From here, if you follow Via Ferracina downstream for a couple of
minutes you'll come to the eighteenth-century Palazzo Sturm (June-Sept
Tues-Sat 9am-12.30pm, Sun 10am-12.30pm & 3.30-6.30pm; April, May & Oct
Tues-Sat 9am-12.30pm, Sun 3.30-6.30pm; Nov-March Fri 9am-12.30pm, Sat &
Sun 3.30-6.30pm; same ticket as Museo Civico) , a showcase for the
town's famed majolica ware.
Various streets and squares in Bassano commemorate the dead of the two
world wars. The major war memorial , however, is out of town on Monte
Grappa . A vast, circular, tiered edifice with a "Via Eroica" leading to
a war museum, it holds 12,000 Italian and Austro-Hungarian dead; less a
symbol of mourning and repentance than a declaration of future
collaboration, it was built by the Fascists in 1935. Buses go up there
from Bassano during the summer months.
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