PIEMONTE / PIEDMONT, the birthplace of the nation of Italy, comprises the upper basin of the Po River at the “pedemontis”, the Latin “at the foot of the mountains” which surround it: the Ligurian Apennines and the Maritime, Cozie, Graie, Pennine and Lepontine Alps. Piemonte is 43% mountains, 30% hills and 26% plains; its many rivers flow into the mighty Po River. With headwaters at Monviso in Piemont, the Po is Italy's longest river flowing through Lombardy, Emilia Romagna and the Veneto on its way out into the Adriatic nourishing the rich farmlands of norhtern Italy in its delta.

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Piedmont was a part of Cisalpine Gaul settled by Celtic-Ligurian tribes including the Taurini. The Romans progressively conquered the territory integrating it into the Roman Empire under Augustus. 

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After the fall of the Western Roman Empire the Piemonte was conquered by the Ostrogoths, the Longobards and then by Charlemange who conquered all Longobard lands in 774. In the 10 and 11 centuries, with no centralized urban power, the territory was fragmented with the land holdings of a host of signori and minor nobility.

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In 1045 most of what is now Piemonte came into the hands of the House of Savoy when the Transalpine [now in France] and Cisalpine [contemporary Italian Piemonte] possessions of the House of Savoy were united with the marriage of Adelaide of Susa with Oddone of Savoy. Cultural relations between Piedmont and France have remained close, French was used at court and in parliament at Turin and its influence survives in Piedmont’s many regional dialects and its cuisine. 

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Over several centuries the feudal House of Savoy gained wealth and power and in 1391 Amedeo VIII di Savoia was made Duke of Savoy by the Holy Roman Emperor elevating the its territory to Duchy of Savoy. Further territory was gained in 1720 when Vittorio Amedeo II di Savoia was awarded the Kingdom of Sardegna [in a bit of political intrigue he was forced by the Spanish to swap Sardegna for the more prosperous Kingdom of Sicily which he had been awarded by the Treaty of Utrecht just three years prior]. The Piedmontese kingdom, like other Italian states, was obliterated by the Napoleonic conquests but the 1815 Treaty of Vienna which negated Napoleon’s acquisitions restored the Savoy kings at Turin and gave them feudal rights over Liguria as well.

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In the decades following the Restoration Piedmont emerged as the principal agent of Italian nationhood. In 1859 Vittorio Emanuele II, with his astute minister Camillo Benso count of Cavour, secured an alliance with France to defeat Austria which at that  occupied northern Italy from Milan to Trieste. The Austrian army was crushed and what is now Lombardy was annexed to Piedmont. The Piemontese gave to France all their dominions west of the Alps (Savoy and Nice) thus establishing the western border, and the remaining Italian provinces were added one by one to Vittorio Emanuele’s kingdom [the only outliers being parts of Friuli Venezia Giulia which remained under Austrian control until annexation into Italy after WWI and WWII]. In 1861 Italy was unified as a nation with Vittorio Emanuele II as King. The juridic and political structure for the new nation was adopted from the Kingdom of Savoy. The capitol of the new nation of Italy had its  royal seat at Turin until 1865 when it was moved briefly to Florence before landing finally in Rome.

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Industrialization of the region was formidable, from the feudal agrarian structure of the Kingdom of Savoy they were able to initiate, as early as the 1850s, rapid modernization. By the early 1900s Turin was a hub in the industrial triangle of Milano Torino Genova. Piemonte was an important part of the Italian economy but modernization came with a cost as it upended the small rural centers of the region. Fiat in Turin along with Ferrero in Alba and Olivetti in Ivrea, in the 1950s and 60s drew an enormous number of workers into the cities from the Veneto, the south (Calabria and Sicily) and from Piemonte itself, migrations that transformed the society and left the countryside abandoned. With the well-deserved success of the wines of Piemonte the local agricultural economy has rebounded. In addition to wine, Langa produces the best quality hazelnuts in the country with 15% of the national production; the largest rice producing area in Italy is in the north of the region at Vercelli and Novara. 

 

LANGA aka THE LANGHE in the southern part of the region of Piemonte the area around Alba in the provinces of Cuneo and Asti is called Langa (plural Langhe), a dialect term that indicates a gently rolling hills characterized by long, narrow ridge lines. Langa is famous for its vineyards and very high quality wines. The landscape of Langa (together with Roero, steeper territory to the north of the Tanaro river) is designated as a UNESCO world heritage site.

Langa is very well known to Italians for its excellent food and wines. The Langhe and Roero are famous for their vineyards mixed with woods of chestnut, pine and oak (good for truffle hunting). The hills are populated with rural villages many of ancient Roman origin, many with castles built by feudal lords and nobility such as the Visconti and the Savoy.

 

LA MORRA, population 2,612, was founded as Murra (enclosure for sheep) in the12 century when Alba Pompeia, as it was known, began to expand by farming the surrounding hillsides. In 1340 the town was under dominion of the Falletti family (from the 1100s the Falletti were a merchant-banker .. pawn-broker .. family from Asti, by the 1700s they were the Marquis of Barolo just to the south of La Morra). In the 1400s the territory of La Morra was ruled by the Duke of Milan, then France and Spain before coming under the House of Saovy in 1631. In WWII La Morra was an active participant in the partisan resistance movement, there were numerous skirmishes in the village and numerous victims. Thanks to Barolo, today La Morra is an active village with an economy based on farming and producing the world famous wine.

At the high point of the little town is piazza Castello, on the site of a castle that was felled in the 1500s. The belltower of 1710 was constructed with the remains of the castle, there’s a bronze Monument to the Vignaiolo (Grape Farmer) of Langa (1972) and a spectacular view out onto the hills cultivated mostly with grapes and hazelnuts. The local elementary school (from 1914) fronts on the piazza, that is the boys’ entrance fronts on the piazza, the girls’ entry is around the side. A few steps past the bell tower, and the girls’ entrance, is the Cantina Comunale, founded in 1973 and located in rooms carved out from an 18 century palazzo of the Marchesi di Barolo; wines from all 70 La Morra producers are available. The the red brick, baroque facade of the church of St. Martin dates to1699, the street in front of the church leads down to the bastions of the medieval ring of defensive walls with their characteristic cuntaròt, lanes paved in Tanaro river stones (walking down the bastions you get to the Corte Gondina).

 

ALBA is the lively urban core of Langa with shops and restaurants serving folks from the villages in the surrounding hills. From the 1100s it was a relatively prosperous free comune and the oldest of the still standing merchant family tower houses date from this period. The ring road around the historic center follows the octagonal walls of the Roman city. The center of town is Piazza Risorgimento, built on the site of the Roman Forum, today with the cathedral and the starting point of the two pedestrian commercial streets via Cavour and via Vittorio Emanuele which is the main corso with good private architecture and a lively passeggiata. The Lombard-gothic cathedral dedicated to San Lorenzo was built at the end of the 1400s on the site of a Romanesque church (some parts of which were recovered and used in the present church), that in turn was built on the site of a 6 century AD early Christian church. 

In WWII, for the 23 days from 10 Oct to 2 Nov 1944, Alba declared itself an independent republic. As the first partisan republic in Italy it received the medal of valor for intense partisan activity as described by Beppe Fenoglio, Albese partisan fighter and author (his family home near the Duomo is now a cultural center). During German occupation the carabinieri marshal of Alba saved numerous Jewish families from deportation, when they eventually risked arrest the marshal, together with his wife and another local woman, facilitated their escape. The industrial sweets company Ferrero (nutella) was founded in Alba in 1945. 

 

TORINO / TURIN, originally settled by the Taurini tribe, became the Roman town Julia Agusta Taurinorum in the 1 century B C. In the middle ages it was ruled by Goths, Lombards and Franks. The regular streets of the ancient Roman urban plan was maintained when the city expanded in the 17 and 18 centuries although with wide boulevards, arcades and elegant and squared piazzas in the style of Paris and it does a bit like a French city. Vestiges of the 18 century city remain in the splendid late Baroque palaces and churches designed by Guarino Guarini and Filippo Juvarra and in the long boulevards populated with elegant, old fashioned cafès.

From 1720 Turin was the capital of the Kingdom of Sardegna and with the Restoration of 1815 it became a center of Italian nationalism with Torinese Camillo Cavour as a principal proponent of Italian liberty. Carlo Alberto, who succeeded to the Savoy throne in 1831, had a profound influence on the appearance of the city and most of its art collections date from this time. Turin was capital Italy under Vittorio Emanuele II through to 1865. 

Long a center of metalworking it has been famous since 1899 as the home of the FIAT motor company.

Allied raids caused heavy damage during WWII. In the post-war period the city expanded its residential neighborhoods to accomodate the large number of immigrants from the Piemontese countryside and from the south of Italy who moved to the city following opportunities for work.

The eventual scruffiness of post-industrial Turin has been smoothed over by efforts to restore the city to its past splendor with carefully renovated facades and gleaming piazzas. 

Turin today is the most important city of the region of Piedmont, population 870,000, and remains one of the most important industrial centers of Italy.

 

LAGO D'ORTA / LAKE ORTA is a glacial lake in the foothills of the Alps, 470 feet deep and just 8 miles long and 1/2 mile wide. The lake’s outlet is the river Nigoglia which, oddly, flows northwards from Omegna at the northern point of the lake. Known for its quiet beauty, on the 19 century Grand Tour Friedrich Nietzsche and Honorè Balzac spent time here. The metallurgy industry developed at Ormegna (Bialetti coffee pots, Alessi kitchen utensils and faucet manufacturers) and by the 20 century the waters of the lake were heavily polluted. The 1989-90 clean-up effort represents an environmental success story: severe acidification was reversed by spraying circa 11,000 tons of finely powdered limestone into the lake and pollution was reigned in by industrial regulation that severely limits discharge into the lake.

The small island Isola San Giulio was apparently purged of snakes in 390 by St. Julius. Today it has one pedestrian path of not quite 1/2 a mile around the perimeter passing a few villas, one restaurant and a Benedictine convent with church dating back to the medieval and romanesque periods.

Orta San Giulio is a charming town on a hilly peninsula with small houses and a few grand villas dating to the 1500s - 1800s. In piazza Motta (with docks) see the charming, original town hall built in 1582, the lanes are filled with shops and cafès and short walk up to the north the small communal gardens opens onto the lake with good views.