Holidays in Savona
Lying on the Letimbro alluvial plain , Savona, originally Savo, was born on the Priamar , a natural hill facing the sea, as a settlement of the Ligurian Sabazi. In the Middle Ages it was an enemy of Genoa in the war between the Guelphs and Ghibellines and was the powerful city of the Della Rovere family , until the Genoese subdued it in 1528, destroying the town and building the fortress. In the nineteenth century, the Savoy family rebuilt the port and the city according to the canons of Savoy architecture.
Worth seeing in Savona
The Priamar fortress built by the Genoese in 1542, in the 19th century it was a prison in which Giuseppe Mazzini was imprisoned, and today it collects various museums (the Priamar museums) such as the Civic Historical-Archaeological Museum, with ancient finds from the Bronze Age to the Etruscan one, the Sandro Pertini Art Museum , with paintings and sculptures that belonged to the President of the Republic and the Renata Cuneo Museum with modern Savona works. The three towers facing the Priamar, the Corsi Tower , the Guarnieri Tower and the Brandale Tower are medieval: on the facade of the latter, you can admire a ceramic Apparition, and medieval frescoes inside.
The historic center of Savona is full of ancient and elegant buildings such as the Palazzo della Rovere , and various other examples can be seen in Via Pia, the central street with sculpted portals and historic houses. In Piazza Salineri , the sixteenth-century Palazzo Grassi Ferrero Doria Lamba , with a sumptuous staircase frescoed like the interiors, and two towers. Palazzo Gavotti , houses the Civic Art Gallery with works from the 1500s to the 1700s and the Milena Milani Modern Art Foundation which preserves works by De Chirico , Picasso and Mirò , just to name a few.
The Cathedral of Santa Maria Assunta , built in 1605, after the Genoese had destroyed the pre-existing one, has a 15th century crucifix and a 1515 choir. From the cloister you can enter the Sistine Chapel , commissioned by Francesco della Rovere (Sixtus IV) but entirely redone in Rococo style. Next to it, the episcopal palace preserves the apartment of Pius VII. In the Oratory of Nostra Signora di Castello , you can visit the Polyptych Madonna and Saints of Brea and Foppa dating back to the end of the 15th century, and the oldest processional chest, as well as the Deposition of Martinengo from 1975. 
Halfway between the medieval and the Savoy cities, between the Old Dock and the modern port, is the fourteenth-century Tower of Leon Pancaldo , dedicated to Magellan's companion navigator; behind it, the 1941 skyscraper of the same name of rationalist architecture. The Old Dock , renovated in 2001, with the new Palacrociere , is the center of Savona's social life, together with Corso Italia which ends at the sea, in the public gardens in front of splendid Art Nouveau buildings.
In the nineteenth-century part of Savona, via Paleocapa preserves many liberty-style residences such as the Palazzo dei Pavoni from 1912 but also five-eighteenth-century churches. Then there is the Chiabrera Theater in Piazza Diaz and finally, further north, there is the Maffiotti house and the Palazzo della Provincia di Nervi (1964).
From the wooded hinterland of Savona it is possible to reach, through the Letimbro Valley , the Sanctuary of Nostra Signora della Misericordia which preserves a marble Visitation , perhaps by Bernini, and in Val Quazzola, towards Vado Ligure, the remains of the road are recognizable ( Aemilia Scauri ) built by the Romans in the five stone bridges that have stood the test of time. Finally, in Quiliano, home of the wines of the Savona hills and the apricot of Valleggia.