A few words about Bologna

Set in the Emilia Romagna area, Bologna is a key town with around 400.000 inhabitants. It is also strategically located at the boundary with the Padana Plain and with the Apennines. The city's territory is mainly flat, although surrounded by hills, thus creating an amazing natural landscape frame. When visiting Bologna most tourists are amazed by the city delicate blend of modernity and old world charm. The city combines the best of several worlds. Its beautiful Renaissance piazzas, churches and museums coexist harmonically with modern cafes, bars and nightlife. Bologna is famous also as a gastronomic haven, renowned for its pasta, sausage, cheese, wine and gelato. This thriving town boasts one of the oldest universities in Europe established in the 11th century.

Bologna has a long and intriguing history as a town that many wanted to subjugate but few actually succeeded. Settled originally during the Bronze Age, over three thousand years ago, by Villanovese tribes, Bologna was afterwards conquered by the Etruscans, who controlled the city from 6th - 4th century B.C. For a short period the city was Gallic but the Celts were driven out by the Romans. This was the time when the town actually received the name Boronia. The city stayed a Roman dependency for over 400 years until the empire fell apart. Boronia then endured a sequence of attacks from the north by the barbarian tribes of Visigoths, Huns, Goths and Lombards.

The city endured centuries of fights for control first by pagan peoples, then by Christians, the Lombards, various Popes and Holy Roman Emperors. Its strategic location, university (established 1088) and rising prosperity from crafts and trade would have made the city an important addition to anyone's empire. The city started by siding the influential family of Guelphs, who supported the papacy, and then the Ghibellines. Eventually the Pope's armies once again made Bologna part of the Papal State. Bologna remained under papal control until Napoleon's arrival at the end of the 18th century. However when Napoleon's empire collapsed, the city went back into Papal control. However Bolognesi were intractable. They supported the rising calls for all of Italy to unite under secular control. In 1860 Bologna together with the rest of the province joined the newly established Kingdom of Italy.

Today Bologna prides itself on one of the most modern Fair Districts in Italy, a professional Congress Building, equipped with up-to-date facilities. Surrounded by hills, the centre of Bologna is much as it was during the Renaissance period: dusky red-coloured edifices, ample piazzas and covered pathways with floors laid with marble. Take a trip along the 40Km arcades, which are a distinctive feature of Bologna's streets, or simply follow the artistic routes while shopping in glamorous boutiques, or at small charming markets. Bologna will provide you with multiform reality. One of the biggest tourist attractions is Piazza Maggiore, which is surrounded by the city's most remarkable medieval and Renaissance buildings and monuments. Its huge pedestrian square and adjoining Piazza del Nettuno, is not a puzzling, on the contrary it is a rather contemplative place; where you can see hundreds of busy Bolognesi carrying on with their daily business tasks, crowding in the cafes and ar ound the street performers.