Knights’ Square, Pisa

No doubt one of the best square I had ever seen. I got there at night time and it was a pleasant surprise. Pisa is not just the leaning tower ,beautiful architecture all around.

Piazza dei Cavalieri in Pisa used to be piazza delle Sette Vie, the political centre of Pisa and likely the site of the Roman Forum: it was later transformed into the centre of the Order of the Knights of Santo Stefano by Cosimo I de’ Medici, created to defend the Tuscan and Mediterranean coast from Turkish fleets and pirates. In the centre of the piazza there is a statue of the Grand Duke of Tuscany, sculpted by Francavilla in 1596. Behind him is Palazzo della Carovana, the former Palazzo Degli Anziano del Popolo which was transformed by Giorgio Vasari into its current appearance and whose façade was completely covered over time by graffiti, drawings and busts of the Medici as they succeeded one another as the Grand Dukes of Tuscany. Currently it is the home of the Scuola Normale Superiore, commissioned by Napoleon Bonaparte to be based on the model of the Ecole in Paris. The greatest Italian professors studied here, like Antonio Pacinotti, Carducci, Pascoli, Fermi and Rubbia.