Carrara

It is a complex of buildings consisting of an early medieval castle to which a stately palace was added in the Renaissance period. The Castle (or Rocca) has very ancient origins and was built on previous fortifications perhaps dating back to the Byzantine-Lombard period. The Renaissance Palace was added in 1519 and enlarged by his son Alberico I in 1557. The Castle-Palace became the seat of the Academy of Fine Arts of Carrara in 1806, making it one of the oldest in Italy and in Europe. The building still presents itself today with two distinct views: the west and south-west sides show a characteristic Renaissance architecture, corresponding to the more recent Prince's Palace, while the east side still retains the ancient medieval style of the original castle.

Includes an amphitheater and the National Archaeological Museum of Luni.

It has a trapezoidal shape and is surrounded by medieval buildings which were restructured and enlarged several times in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, such as the elegant and decorated (internally and externally) Baroque palace of the Sarteschi counts on the west side, the old rectory on the south side (still in Gothic style on the ground floor), the house where Michelangelo Buonarroti lived on the north side almost as a continuation of the south side of the Cathedral in Romanesque-Gothic style. Between the "Buonarroti" house and the apse of the cathedral, the "new" sixteenth-century rectory can be glimpsed with frescoed walls and the bell tower, consisting of a square-plan tower with a marble structure, surmounted by an octagonal spire whose model can almost be found identical in bell towers which are scattered along the, i.e. Comacini masters) of cathedrals that descended from the north of France, crossed the Savoy region, overcoming the historic passes of the Western Alps (Lanslebourg, Aosta) touching Liguria (Lavagna, Genoa) until arriving in Carrara, the historic place of excavation and processing of stone.

The square owes its name to Alberico I Cybo-Malaspina, who had it built in the seventeenth century close to the city walls, which he himself had built with a second layout (1557-1637) to include the growing urban expansion.

Via Alberica was born in the 16th century as a rationalization of previous routes and as a connection axis between the Piazza del Mercato (now Alberica) and the Palazzo del Principe. Running parallel to the southern stretch of the sixteenth-century city walls, it was supposed to connect the gates on the sea side but remained short. Elegant 18th-century palaces of the old Carrara nobility overlook it. Towards Piazza Alberica, on the mountain side, there was the magistrate's court.

In the centre of the square stands a majestic fountain with a ball which, pushed by the motion of the water, performs a rotary motion; it was sculpted by the American Kenneth Davis in 1979 with the help of the artist Mario Fruendi with marble from the Polvaccio quarry.

A singular triangular-shaped space, next to the Animosi theatre. It connects in shape and size to the square in front of the theatre so that the two spaces become elements of a single singular square. The arrangement was made by Eng. Leandro Caselli in 1887. In the center is the monument to Garibaldi.

Historical site of the food market.