City Fortress

The only example of a city of foundation still intact in its form of a nine-pointed star, Palmanova is one of the most important models of military architecture in the modern age, with its star plan formed by three concentric walls, two of them built by the Serenissima Republic of Venice made up of nine bulwarks and nine ravelins and a third, the most external, made up of nine “lunette”, added by Napoleon at the beginning of the 19th century.

It was built in 1593, on the basis of a precise design idea developed by a team of engineers and treatise written to strengthen the defenses on the Friulian territory against the invasions of the Turks and the expansionist aims of the Habsburgs: a perfect example of “modern” fortifications of the age late Renaissance.

In 1960 the fortress was declared a National Monument. On July 9 2017 it became part of the Unesco World Heritage, within the transnational site “The Venetian defense works between the 16^th and 17^th centuries. Land state – Western sea state”, together with the cities of Bergamo, Peschiera del Garda, Sibenico, Cattaro and Zara (www.unesco-venetianfortresses.com). Since 2018 it has also been included among the ‘Most beautiful boroughs in Italy’.

A dense network of tunnels winds between the fortifications, some of these equipped and open to visitors, which allowed the movement of the militias away from the gaze of the besiegers. Along the entire perimeter of the walls, more than four kilometers long, it is possible to practice sports or take a simple walk admiring the majesty of the defensive works and the natural landscape rich in flora and fauna.

Entering trough one of the three doors, you quickly reach the heart of the city, the Big Square, perfectly hexagonal, overlooked by the main monuments: the Doge Cathedral with its baroque façade, the eleven statues of the general supervisors, who administered the fortress to The Palazzo del Provveditore Generale, then a symbol of military and civil power, now the Town Hall, the Loggia della Gran Guardia, which housed the guardhouse to protect the square and the Provveditore, the Loggia dei Mercanti, the Palazzo del Monte di Pietà.

The Museum of the Great War and the Palmanova Fortress, above Porta Cividale, illustrates the military history of the Fortress from its foundation to the present day.