Ferrara, City of the Renaissance, and its Po Delta

The House of Este left its mark on the city’s layout, reshaping its structure and inventing the modern concept of the urban plan. The result is the first city plan in modern Europe, promoted by Ercole I, Duke of Este, and known as Ercolean Addition (1492). Biagio Rossetti worked out the theme of the Renaissance perspective and created an overall urban system that joined the medieval part with the new northern part of the city. The Este Castle, built north of the city in the late 14^th century as a military fortress to protect the Duchy, was converted into a sumptuous residence for the Court in the following century. With the Ercolean Addition, the Castle became the very heart of Ferrara, a new street developing in front of it, the large Corso Ercole I d’Este, still dotted with stately palaces, such as the famous Palazzo dei Diamanti. The famous extension of the city, built on wide avenues at right angles with each other, went hand in hand with the building of a defensive system that was typical of the Renaissance, with round keeps and tree-lined embankments, and that is still an outstanding specimen of military architecture. The city walls run around the city centre for over nine kilometres, with keeps, bastions and curtain walls added all around it over the centuries.

The diplomatic skills of the House of Este and the intellectual vibrancy of its Court turned Ferrara into a capital of European breadth. In the three centuries during which the House of Este ruled the city, monumental, cultural, administrative and political initiatives were taken to make the city’s look and shape embody the magnificence and stability of its power. The city was redeveloped according to a plan, and reclamations and buildings took place in the properties of the House of Este, which spread out as far as the Po Delta. The House of Este’s eagerness for reshaping and rearranging the natural landscape was fuelled by the courtly and chivalric ideals inspired by the French culture, by a love for antiquity seen through the eyes of Humanism, and by an extraordinary pragmatism. The ideal of Buon Governo (Good Government) and the virtues of the Humanist Prince were the way to go, to achieve such goals.

The House of Este reshaped the landscape around the old Po Delta, where land alternates with water in a never-ending, ever-changing interplay, without altering the physical identity of those places but taking inspiration from their features. Great reclamations took place in the marshlands, and canals protected by towers and fences were built to optimise the rivers and make the land health and tillable. What the House of Este is best known for, though, are the Delizie, residences designed for a travelling Court and for a double purpose: for administration and entertainment. These country residences increased the power of the House of Este on the area and gave it a consistent, distinctive image. The Delizie stood next to streams, in strategic locations along the tight network of waterways around the Delta, and were built for geopolitical reasons: villages surrounded by gardens, courtyards, workshops, offices and housing for the accountants, workers and labourers who tilled the land and looked after the game reserves. The other purpose of the Delizie was to impress people with their architectural beauty, their wide variety of art collections, and the natural settings of their heavenly gardens, to be flaunted before illustrious guests and visiting diplomats. The name Delizia, universally used in historiography, emphasises their aesthetic, celebratory and convivial role by hinting at the pleasant activities that took place there, such as hunts, banquets, plays and parties.

Ferrara owes its great historical and cultural achievements to the House of Este, which managed to impose itself on the city in the 13^th century, thus kick-starting a thriving season of unprecedented artistic excellence. The House of Este ruled the city until 1598, when the heirless Ferrara was transferred to the Papacy. The rest of the family had to move to Modena, a city that the Emperor had given over to the House of Este.

It is the palace that ushers in the House of Este’s ‘tradition’ of the Delizie and the only Delizia urbana that is still perfectly preserved. The name hints at the pleasures it had been built for: the word Schifanoia actually means “schivar la noia”, banish boredom. In 1385, Alberto V d’Este, Marquis of Ferrara, wanted it to be built just out of the city centre, near two of the oldest churches, Santa Maria in Vado and Sant’Andrea. Then, Biagio Rossetti extended the palace. The Delizia di Schifanoia is well known for the frescoes of the Salone dei Mesi (The Room of the Months), which depict the Renaissance Calendar, with symbols, astrological images and portraits of the Greek Olympian gods; the painting of each month is completed by scenes of courtly life, celebrating the power of the House of Este. The cycle of paintings, only partly frescoed, and now lacking all the dry-painted part, was commissioned by Duke Borso to the Scuola Ferrarese, the painting school that developed within the Este Court, circa 1469. Some scholars have tried to identify the often-mysterious figures painted in the Salone dei Mesi and found classic, Indian and Arab influences, testament to subjects and meanings ‘migrating’ over the centuries. The frescoes bring to life an exceptional picture of Renaissance culture, as well as exclusive evidence of cultural contaminations across the centuries and the populations. Next to Salone dei Mesi, the Sala delle Virtù (The Room of Virtues), painted by Domenico di Paris (1467), celebrates the House of Este in the portraits of the theological and cardinal virtues and exhibits heraldic devices (the white eagle) and symbols of Borso d’Este’s accomplishments: the unicorn (purity), the fence (health through reclamation), baptism (prudence), fire (charity and love). Several collections, such as coins, pottery and precious illuminated codices, are guarded there, along with precious decorations dating back to those years.

Delizia dei Bagni Ducali – Ferrara, Viale Alfonso d’Este 17

It was a stately building, known as Delizia della Montagna di Sotto. Ercole II d’Este had it built in 1541; it was destroyed just after the Duchy was transferred to the Papal State (1598). The Delizia included gardens, fountains, a maze, a fishpond within and next to the embankments behind two bastions. The Montagna, the Mountain, was built on two vaulted rooms. The Bagni Ducali, the spa, built to resemble a Roman domus, are the only remains of such a beautiful estate. Assumedly designed by Girolamo da Carpi, the building was probably decorated with wall paintings both inside and outside. Today, it hosts part of the municipal offices.

Delizia del Belriguardo (Municipality of Voghiera, Via Provinciale 286)

Nicolò III d’Este, Marquis of Ferrara, had the Delizia del Belriguardo built in 1435. His “decision” concentrates the ideas and myths of a Court that was ahead of its time in its interest for practising humanistic theories and giving a concrete form to the influence of the classic culture. It is actually here, ten miles from town, that the oldest Roman settlement in the region of Ferrara can be found. The land did not belong to the House of Este, and there were not even the streams their country residences used to be built on, but the place was so charming that such problems were easily overcome. It was the first time that an antique-style villa based on Vitruvius’s concept of the Greek house, with two large and square roofed galleries, placed in a sequence and joined by a two-floor building, was built in Italy. Plumbing was added under the rule of Borso, Duke of Ferrara, along with a huge fishpond with water features. Frescoes by Pisanello, Cosmè Tura and Ercole de’ Roberti decorated the rooms. Ercole II and Alfonso II (XVI century) had new cycles painted by Dosso and Battista Dossi, Girolamo da Carpi and Garofalo. Of all these frescoes, only those of the Sala delle Vigne have survived. There were wonderful Italian gardens, the biggest ever, covering about twenty hectares, with fountains, bushy mazes, streams and precious collections of plants skilfully laid out to impress visitors. Nowadays, the Delizia del Belriguardo is home to Museo Civico: the Archaeological Section with findings from the Roman necropolis of Voghenza (I-III century AD). The Sala delle Vigne guards the Renaissance Sections, with XV and XVI century pottery and records about the Delizia; and the Modern Art Section is in the entrance Tower.

Delizia del Verginese (loc. Gambulaga, Municipality of  Portomaggiore, Via del Verginese 56)

Girolamo da Carpi assumedly designed this building on an earlier farmhouse; it included a brolo (a square or rectangular garden or vegetable plot, with fruit trees laid out in distinctive geometrical shapes on a grassy covering), vegetable plots, vineyards and a dovecote. In 1534, Alfonso I, Duke of Ferrara, gave it as a present to Laura Dianti, the mother of his two sons, Alfonso and Alfonsino. The building is rectangular in shape, has two floors and four crenelated towers at the corners, and stands out for the contrast of colour between the white of the plaster and the ‘terracotta’ of the edges and corners of the towers. Due to the importance of the natural surroundings and the availability of precious records, the garden currently located between the building and the dovecote (already there in 1533) was landscaped in the traditional style of the old Renaissance gardens of Ferrara.

Delizia di Benvignante (loc. Benvignante, Municipality of Argenta, Via Nazionale 180)

In 1464, Borso d’Este commissioned it to architect Pietro Benvenuto degli Ordini and donated it to Teofilo Calcagnini, who was his secretary and advisor and the Court’s man of letter. Vineyards were probably grown around there, so it must have been named after them. The Delizia had gardens, vegetable plots, a chapel, the steward’s house and a dovecote. In the 19^th century, one floor was added to the building. The crenelated tower and the hall with the cloister vault that leads to the inner courtyard are all that’s left of the old building.

Mesola Castle (Municipality of Mesola, Piazza Santo Spirito)

It was the last delizia estense, in chronological order. In 1578, to mark the end of the great reclamation of the surrounding land, a huge circle of walls began to be built on the river island of Mesola, with twelve quadrangular keeps, home to a group of elegant buildings, encircling the Duke’s Palace designed by Carpi-born architect Marco Antonio Pasi. The Court’s masons worked there until 1598, in the attempt to flesh out a strategically and commercially valuable plan that should have captured the Adriatic trade routes and brought them inwards. In the prime of its life, the Mesola Castle was embellished with polychrome decorations all over the façade, crowned by glazed ceramic details. The Court used to go there in the autumn and hunt the plentiful game that populated the surroundings. A perfect, useful and wonderful example of the ideal transformation of an area where nature successfully met human labour and that touched the entire landscape in that wide expanse, the wood, the river, all rolled into one. In 1599, the Republic of Venice, aware of the increasing commercial importance that such centre was gaining, ruled the so-called “Taglio di Porto Viro”, a deviation that in a few years silted up the loop and port of Goro, the direct access to the Adriatic Sea. It now hosts an educational trail, “In lode della Mesola, il castello, le mura, il barco” (1^st floor) and the ”Museo del Bosco e del Cervo della Mesola “ (2^nd floor).

Villa della Mensa (loc. Sabbioncello San Vittore, Municipality of Copparo, Via Magnanina 3)

Probably built in the first decade of the 14^th century and heavily reworked in the 17^th and 18^th centuries, the building still exhibits a lot of 15^th-century features. It is a valuable group of monuments, in which the Bishops and Cardinals of Ferrara, including Ippolito d’Este, Luigi d’Este and Tommaso Ruffo, used to stay. Bartolomeo della Rovere, nephew of Pope Sixtus IV, had it extended between 1474 and 1495.

Delizia di Fossadalbero (loc. Fossadalbero, Municipality of Ferrara)

This is one of the many Delizie that Niccolò III, Marquis of Ferrara, had built; designed by Giovanni da Siena (1424), it was assumedly a favourite with his young second wife, Parisina Malatesta. The Delizia di Fossadalbero looks like a crenelated castle, with an impressive square tower on the façade; it was heavily restored in the 19^th century. Now, the palace is private property.

Palazzo Pio (Municipality of Tresigallo, Via del Mare 277)

In the years in which the House of Este ruled the Duchy of Ferrara, Tresigallo was a small rural community on the eastern plain, run through by the river Po di Volano. The elegant building now known as Palazzo Pio was assumedly built by Alessandro Feruffino, captain of Duke Alfonso I d’Este’s army, between 1517 and 1531. The tower that stands on one side of the building protected the adjoining house and its appurtenances.

Delizia di Copparo (Municipality of Copparo)

It started to be built under the rule of Niccolò III and resembled a castle. Destroyed by the Venetians in 1482, Ercole II, Duke of Ferrara, commissioned Terzo de’ Terzi to rebuild it, so it became a sumptuous palace with impressive towers at the top and frescoes by Benvenuto Tisi da Garofalo and Girolamo da Carpi. It was badly damaged in a fire in the early 19^th century. Some remains of the Delizia are inside the Town Hall. The only thing left is a lone tower, named “Torre Estense”, which is now home to the Municipal Library.

Delizia di Zenzalino (Municipality of Copparo)

Zenzalino was first mentioned in the XII century. In 1434, it belonged to the Pendaglia family, then after 1475 to Count Trotti’s family. The building was completely altered in 1810. The exposed brickwork façade is a long body with two tall towers at the sides. The noble chapel, with its classic, plain features and the date 1830 written inside on the transom at the entrance, is on the right, connected to the palace by an elevated corridor. The exedra-shaped greenhouse built in later years (1920s) is on the left. The outstandingly beautiful park at the back, built in the late XX century by Augusto Grossi, also contains a dovecote, a ice-house and a Swiss chalet in front of a small lake.

Delizia di Medelana (loc. Medelana, Municipality of Ostellato)

It was Borso d’Este that wanted it built in 1450 to practice falconry. Ercole I d’Este commissioned Biagio Rossetti to improve the building. According to some sources, that place of leisure was a favourite with Lucrezia Borgia and then with Marfisa d’Este, who hosted Torquato Tasso there. The dialogue “La Molza overo de l’Amore” was composed by Tasso in remembrance of his stay in Medelana. The dialogue involves three ladies, including Tarquinia Molza, a Modena-born woman of letters who stayed in Ferrara for years as lady-in-waiting to the princesses of the House of Este.

Delizia della Diamantina (loc. Diamantina, Municipality of Vigarano Mainarda)

In 1506, Ercole I d’Este, Duke of Ferrara, bought the estate to convert it into a hunting lodge. The Delizia takes its name from diamond, a symbol of the House of Este that Ercole I particularly liked. The palace, which included stables, a vegetable plot, a fine dovecote and large barns, was the administrative centre of the estate, surrounded by a densely populated village first mentioned in 1590 as the “steward’s house”, with farmhouses built in the years of the House of Este.

Even if many of the buildings and most of the gardens that surrounded the “Delizie estensi” have disappeared, surveys found that the memory of such old buildings is still cherished in these places.  The marks left by them are clearly visible in aerial photographs.

Delizia di Belfiore – Ferrara

It was commissioned by Alberto V d’Este in the late 14^th century as a hunting lodge to Bartolino da Novara, the architect who had built the castles in Ferrara and Mantova. Belfiore has been passed down as a Garden of Eden, loved by Leonello d’Este, Marquis of Ferrara (1441-1450), who, with the help of Guarino Veronese, had designed and furnished a cabinet dedicated to the Muses, Italy’s first noble cabinet. The building was destroyed by the Venetian troops in 1483.

Delizia di Belvedere – Ferrara

It was a palace surrounded by gardens and located on a sandy island on the southern branch of the Po, not far from the now-disappeared Tedaldo Castle – the medieval fortification that protected the area. Wit began to be built in 1513 by Cardinal Ippolito I d’Este’s decision and finished around 1550; the result was an extraordinary villa in the middle of the river, with loggias, staircases, frescoes, fountains and gardens with precious collections of plants and exotic animals – mainly rare birds. It is here that Torquato Tasso’s Aminta was first performed (1573). It was demolished in 1608 to make room for the Papal Fortress.

Pavilion Gardens – Ferrara

A large garden stood in front of the Este Castle, opposite the northern ravelin. A domed pavilion at the centre held a gilded copper ball on top, the emblem of gunner-duke Alfonso I d’Este (1505-1534), that is, a grenade with three tongues of flame. It was dismantled in 1633.

Cavo-La Peschiera Gardens – Ferrara

First (1462), a canal was dug across the moat of the Castle, along the Pavilion gardens, then it was extended and converted into a fishpond (1497), where plenty of snow-white swans and other water birds owned by the Duke could be seen endlessly wandering about (“ir vagando di continuo gran copia di bianchissimi cigni ed altri augei acquatici ivi d’ordine del duca nutriti”) (M.A. Guarini). In 1577, Alfonso II, Duke of Ferrara, made the canal navigable as far as the Po. Gardens and vegetable plots grew on its banks as a sort of vegetable wing, behind which the Dukes could walk unseen.

Delizia di Castellina and Gardens – Ferrara

It was a hunting lodge, that Alfonso I, Duke of Ferrara, had built in the early 16^th century (1505). It was named like that because it looked like a small castle, even if it had no military purpose and was more of a spa, with even a stove to heat up the water. It had gardens and vegetable plots and stood near today’s Via Cittadella.

Chiaronome, Ragnaia and Cedrara Gardens – Ferrara

The first one was split into two grassy areas behind the west walls, astride the Duke’s canal. The second one, covered in thick, impassable vegetation, was nearby. The third one was located next to the San Benedetto Gate and was grown with huge orange, cedar and lemon trees that the local people were very much impressed about (“aranci cedri and limoni grandissimi, che in queste nostre parti era di grandissima ammirazione”) (M.A. Guarini).

La Montagnola and La Rotonda – Ferrara

It was one of the favourite places for the Court to spend time in. The ‘mountain’ was a hillock made of earth from the north walls.

Delizia di Francolino, loc. Francolino, Municipality of Ferrara

The sources mentions a Delizia erected near the Francolino mooring place along the navigable stretch of the Po. It was supposedly the place where in 1476 Ercole I d’Este, Duke of Ferrara, received the King of Hungary, Matthias Corvinus, and his wife, Beatrice of Aragon.

Villa dell’Isola, loc. Confortino, Municipality of Ferrara

It was a residence that Ercole II d’Este, Duke of Ferrara, had built between Pontelagoscuro and Francolino.

Delizia Estense di Baura, loc. Baura, Ferrara

Ippolito I d’Este had a Delizia built by Biagio Rossetti between 1513 and 1515, with a tower, a loggia and gardens connected to the nearby hunting lodge. Only a few records remain of such building.

Delizia di Quartesana, loc. Quartesana, Municipality of Ferrara

It assumedly stood on the site of today’s 19^th-century villa, opposite the provincial road. Alberto d’Este and Parisina Malatesta, then Borso, Duke of Ferrara, used to spend time there.

Parisina Tower, loc. Gualdo, Municipality of Voghiera

The tower is mentioned as part of Parisina Malatesta’s dowry. Now, the tower has been annexed to Villa Navarra.

Delizia di Montesanto, loc. Montesanto, Municipality of Voghiera

It was a villa (circa 1450) that Borso d’Este had built; it was bombed and razed to the ground by the allies of World War II.

Delizia di Ostellato, Municipality of Ostellato

It was located where the Town Hall now stands; the marble capitals of the old Delizia in which Lucrezia Borgia stayed are inside.

Porto Castle, Municipality of Portomaggiore

It was a massive fortress dating back to the mid-14^th century (1344). It is also known for the bloody battle between Azzo d’Este’s armies and Niccolò III (1396). Remains of the Este fortress, which was surrounded by a moat and had stables and barns close to the walls, were still visible in the early 20^th century.

Hunting lodge, loc. Libolla, Municipality of Ostellato

Dating from 1450, it was a hunting lodge. The building is now known as “Casematte”.

Delizia di Migliaro, Municipality of Fiscaglia

It stood in front of today’s parish church and is now a private house with a stone mentioning the earlier building and the year it was demolished (1886). It had a loggia with 15^th-century frescoes painted by Bono da Ferrara and Galasso.

Delizia di Consandolo, loc. Consandolo, Municipality of Argenta

Commissioned by Niccolò III (1393-1441), it was Parisina Malatesta’s favourite place; it was eventually given as a gift to Renée of France, Ercole II d’Este’s wife. The building is now known as “il Conventone”.

Delizia di Sabbioncello San Pietro, loc. Sabbioncello San Pietro, Municipality of Copparo

It was located under the riverbank of Po di Volano; it is now a private house.

Delizia di Scortichino, loc. Scortichino, Municipality of Bondeno

Listed in the inventory of Alfonso II d’Este’s properties. It is probably the building that is now known as Palazzo Cremonini, but there are very few records about the old Delizia.

La Tagliata, loc. Marozzo, Municipality of Lagosanto

It was a hunting lodge in an area full of streams, listed in the inventory of Alfonso II d’Este’s properties in 1598. It had four towers too.

Delizia Le Casette, Municipality of Comacchio

It was a big villa, built near the ‘casette’ or fish shops, between the Port of Magnavacca and Comacchio. Between 1490 and 1495, Biagio Rossetti converted an earlier building into a residential palace with gardens, greenhouses, woods and seawater fishponds. In 1575, Torquato Tasso read the last canto of his “Gerusalemme Liberata” to the Court for the first time. The Casette were repeatedly pillaged, then they completely disappeared in the 19^th century.

One of the most famous Delizie Estensi is Palazzo Schifanoia, which is within the Renaissance walls. Its Salone dei Mesi, The Room of Months, is decorated with a cycle of frescoes with astrological subjects by the painting school of Ferrara. The frescoes at Schifanoia are a grand portrait of the culture of the time, which describes the habits, customs and cultural influences of the Este Court and those of the Renaissance in general. Many scholars have tried to understand the meaning of the cycle of frescoes at Schifanoia, where the months of the year follow each other, each one split into three horizontal bands, depicting, from the top down, the triumphs of the Olympian gods associated with each month; the astrological sign with the Decans next to it (the Decans were guardian deities that protected a decade each), and lastly scenes of courtly life that celebrated the House of Este. The Room of Months at Schifanoia is a unique combination of classic culture, eastern features and typical Humanistic innovation, an extraordinary example of the peculiar spirit of the Renaissance.

A pregnant symbol of the power of the House of Este has been found to be the image of a diamond ring on top of a flower decorated with vegetable patterns. Here, the diamond is associated with the strength and incorruptibility of the ruler, who protects the State and keeps it thriving, as symbolised by the flower. Other symbols that the House of Este identified with are: The unicorn, dipping its horn in water; a gesture that has a cleansing meaning and conveys the feeling of the redevelopment of the area, after the reclamations and hydraulic works completed by the House of Este; The blindfolded lynx, the symbol of the ruler’s wisdom; The Hydra, a mythological many-headed animal that stands for the marshlands and assumedly another symbol of the redevelopment of the area; The fence is a sort of paling and the symbol of the weirs used in the reclamations; a pumpkin tied to the fence marks the depth of the water, as a sort of homemade water gauge; it too is a symbol of the redevelopment of the area.

Lucrezia Borgia, Duchess of Ferrara, is a female icon of Italian Renaissance. One of her passions was chess, a love she shared with her sister-in-law, Isabella d’Este, Marquise of Mantova, to whom Luca Pacioli, a mathematician, had dedicated his De ludo scachorum, a book that laid down the modern rules of the game. And, to play, Lucrezia even had a chess master, Francesco Spagnolo, probably the Francesch Vicent mentioned as the author of the first printed book on chess, which set out the modern rules of the game. The modern form of the game, which mainly involves the Queen piece, actually became established in the sixteenth century, when some important women became influential on the Italian and European political arena. Originally, chess, which came from the East, only had male pieces but, in Europe, the Queen soon appeared next to the King and, in the early 13^th century, it became more prominent on the chessboard. However, it could move very little: just one square diagonally. In the late fifteenth century, the Queen was let to move in any direction so it became the most powerful piece on the chessboard.

Under the rule of the House of Este, a genuine art of banqueting throve in Ferrara, partly boosted by the efforts of Cristoforo da Messisbugo, the Court’s famous steward. Local chronicles describe the fabulous parties at which delicious and spectacular dishes used to be served. Never-ending banquets with spectacular arrangements of game and fish are described in his books. In addition, the origins of some of those dishes, which are still considered to be typical of the city’s tables, date back to the years when Cristoforo prepared his dishes to impress the House of Este.

At first, Ferrara’s development was boosted by trade along the river Po, which was favourably connected with the other waterways. The House of Este, who had made magnificence an instrument of political power, turned the Court of Ferrara into one of Europe’s greatest centres of cultural innovation and influence. The scholars and artists who worked in Ferrara, such as Biagio Rossetti, Matteo Maria Boiardo, Ludovico Ariosto, Torquato Tasso, were beacons of Italian art and literature. The University – one of the oldest in Italy, founded by Alberto V, Marquis of Este, in 1391 – flourished and attracted illustrious scholars, such as Guarino Veronese, Celio Calcagnini, Nicolaus Copernicus and Paracelsus; Leon Battista Alberti and Giovanni Pico della Mirandola stayed in Ferrara. Such outstanding painters as Cosmè Tura, Francesco del Cossa, Ercole de’ Roberti created a painting school – Officina ferrarese.

The two daughters of Ercole I d’Este and Eleanor of Aragon were universally admired as iconic women: Isabella d’Este (1474 –1539) married Francesco II Gonzaga, Marquis of Mantova. Learned, elegant, beautiful, sharp-witted, a patroness of the arts and a great collector, who personally knew Mantegna, Perugino, Leonardo. She had excellent diplomatic and managerial skills and helped her husband in the ruling of the State. With her jewels and extraordinary dresses, she became a fashion icon for all of the Courts of the time. Isabella’s sister, Beatrice d’Este (1475 –1497), became Duchess of Milan and married Ludovico Sforza. Her death giving birth at the early age of 22 did not prevent her from making the Milanese Court shine bright with art, literature and music, and with the splendours of fashionable life.

Biagio Rossetti (Ferrara, 1447 circa – Ferrara, 1516)

arrived at the Este Court in 1483. He was commissioned by Ercole I d’Este to design the Erculean Addition, the great Renaissance extension of the city, one of the most outstanding accomplishments in the history of European planning. He managed to join the old medieval-looking part of town grown around the canal docks on the Po with the ‘new’ city, through a plan that kept it enclosed between the walls for centuries. He is the author of some of the finest palaces in Ferrara: Palazzo dei Diamanti, Palazzo di Giulio II and Palazzo Costabili, also known as Palazzo di Ludovico il Moro.

Ludovico Ariosto (Reggio Emilia, 1474 – Ferrara, 1533)

is Italy’s greatest chivalric epic poet. He wrote in Latin and in the vulgar tongue, but his greatest work is L’Orlando Furioso, the poem he spent a good part of his life writing and that celebrates «le donne, i cavalier, l’arme, gli amori», ladies, knights, arms, loves, in other words facts of war entwined with the love affairs of its male and female characters. L’Orlando furioso is conceived as a “gionta”, a joint to or a continuation of Matteo Maria Boiardo’s poem Orlando innamorato, also written for the Court of Ferrara. Ariosto’s biography goes hand in hand with the House of Este, because he was employed by Cardinal Ippolito I d’Este for a long time. In 1518, he went to live at the Court of Ferrara at the service of Alfonso d’Este, Duke of Ferrara, in a managerial-diplomatic capacity.

Torquato Tasso (Sorrento, 1544 – Rome, 1595)

one of the greatest Italian poets of his century, is a beacon of Italian literature. He wrote the pastoral poem Aminta and the chivalric poem Gerusalemme liberata, as well as prose dialogues and a huge mass of letters. Tasso’s writings and personal life are a perfect portrait of the conflicts going on in the cultural milieus of that time: the ideological circles of the Counter-Reformation, the relationships between men of letters and established powers, the modern aspiration to freedom of thought, the renewal of the Italian language. In 1565, he was employed by Cardinal Luigi d’Este and moved to Ferrara, where we was welcomed into the Court, especially by Lucrezia and Eleonora, the sisters of Alfonso II, Duke of Ferrara. In 1576, he was appointed Court historiographer but, despite all the celebrations and accolades, the poet fell into an overwhelming psychological malaise that first drove him to leave Ferrara, then, in Ferrara again, confined him to the jail of Ospedale di Sant’Anna for seven years. Vincenzo Gonzaga stepped in and helped him leave Ferrara once and for all in 1586. This marked the beginning of the last, troubled years of his life, when he wandered from Court to Court, followed by a feeling of estrangement and an obsessive dissatisfaction with his works. He ended his days in Rome, living off a life allowance granted by the Pope. The close relationships between Tasso and Princess Eleonora d’Este created the legend of a sad love that inspired many 19^th-century literary poems (Goldoni, Byron), plays (Goethe) and operas (Donizetti, Liszt).

Leonello d’Este (Ferrara, 1407 – Voghiera (Fe), 1450)

He is the quintessential Humanist Prince. The illegitimate child of Nicolò III, Marquis of Ferrara, and Stella dei Tolomei, he received the best education according to the standards of the time: he was educated in the military art by Braccio da Montone, a condottiere, and in the figurative arts by the Humanist poet Guarino Veronese. The Pope entitled him to inherit his father’s title. He founded the first hospital in town, he boosted Studium, the university; he assumedly opened the first Renaissance cabinet and he also paved the way to portrait medals, a successful style that became popular in all the European Courts. Angelo Decembrio states that Leonello wore a different colour for each day in a week, the planetary colour associated with that day, and he called to his Court Leon Battista Alberti – who was commissioned by him to wrote De re aedificatoria – and then Pisanello, Jacopo Bellini, Andrea Mantegna, Piero della Francesca. He died in the Delizia di Belriguardo.

 

►  “Del re de’ fiumi tra l’altiere corna/ or siede umile (diceagli) e piccol borgo:/ dinnanzi il Po, di dietro fli soggiorna/ d’alta palude un nebuloso gorgo;/ che, volgendosi gli anni, la più adorna/ di tutte le città d’Italia scorgo,/ non pur di mura d’ampli tetti regi,/ ma di bei studi e di costumi egregi”. 

Ludovico Ariosto

 

►  “Mesola, il Po da  ’lati e  ’l mar a fronte,

e d’intorno le mura e dentro i boschi

e seggi ombrosi e foschi

fanno le tue bellezze altere e conte;

e son opre d’Alfonso, e più non fece

mai la natura e l’arte a far non lece;

ma che la valle sembri un paradiso

la donna il fa che n’ha sembianti e viso”

Tasso, Rime

(nell’ultimo verso la “donna” si riferisce a Margherita Gonzaga, terza sposa di Alfonso II d’Este. In lei erano riposte le speranze del proseguimento della linea dinastica della famiglia d’Este che sfumarono per mancanza di eredi legittimi.    Il Ducato venne riannesso allo Stato Pontificio  nel 1598.)

 

►  “Il sole al tramonto, forando una scura coltre di nuvole basse all’orizzonte, illuminava vivamente ogni cosa […] alte sopra la bruna distesa dei tetti, le lontane moli del Castello Estense e del Duomo”

Giorgio Bassani, Gli occhiali d’oro

 

►  “Ferrara poi, la pentagona città dove son nato, è davvero un terreno fertile di dilettevoli meraviglie per l’uomo sagace. ‘Chi à visto Siviglia, à visto meraviglia’, dice un vecchio adagio spagnolo, ma chi à visto Ferrara à visto anche di più”.

Filippo De Pisis, La città dalle cento meraviglie

 

►  […] Alla corte estense l’astrologia aveva un ruolo importante: di Lionello d’Este si racconta ad esempio che per ogni giorno della settimana indossasse, come gli antichi magi sabi, un abito del corrispondente colore planetario. Pietro Bono Avogaro, uno degli astrologi di corte, scriveva pronostici per ogni anno, mentre un certo Carla da Sangiorgio prediceva il futuro perfino mediante la geomanzia […]. In realtà non fu Avogaro, ma l’altro professore di astronomia all’Università di Ferrara, vale a dire Pellegrino Prisciani, bibliotecario e allo stesso tempo storiografo di corte, l’ispiratore sommamente erudito delle immagini dei mesi di Palazzo Schifanoia..]

(Aby Warburg, Arte italiana e astrologia internazionale, in La Rinascita del Paganesimo Antico e altri scritti 1889-1914, Aragno, Torino, pp. 544-5).

 

Bartolino da Novara was the architect and engineer who was commissioned by Nicolò II d’Este to design the Este Castle in Ferrara, dedicated to St Michael, started in 1385. Bartolino da Novara also designed the Castle of St George in Mantova, built between 1395 and 1406 and home to the House of Gonzaga since the mid-15^th century. Isabella d’Este, daughter of Ercole I d’Este, Duke of Ferrara, and Eleanor of Aragon, married Francesco Gonzaga in 1490, thus becoming the Marquise of Mantova and binding both dynasties together. The Camera Picta or Bridal Chamber frescoed by Andrea Mantegna is in the north-east tower of the Castle. He decorated the Gonzaga Court with the elegance and love for art that he had been imbued with while at the Este Court. In the Erculean Addition, part of the city is theoretically planned, the plan is put in practice according to the standards of the ideal city and neatly laid out like Sabbioneta, which was planned by Vespasiano Gonzaga.

Cardinal Ippolito II d’Este was the client and the lord of Villa d’Este, after his appointment as Governor of Tivoli. He was the son of Alfonso I d’Este, Duke of Ferrara, and Lucrezia Borgia. The gardens of the villa are a masterpiece of Renaissance engineering and an outstanding example of an Italian garden; the gardens are dotted with fountains, tanks and waterfalls with an impressively wide range of spectacular water features. The ornamentation of the architectural complex and the gardens at Villa d’Este were based on an iconographic plan that celebrates the virtues of strength and chastity of both Cardinal Ippolito and the House of Este.

Alla corte degli Estensi: filosofia, arte e cultura a Ferrara nei secoli XV e XVI, atti del Convegno internazionale di studi Ferrara, 5-7 marzo 1992, a cura di M. Bertozzi, Ferrara, Università degli studi, 1994

Delizie a Ferrara. Residenze principesche alla corte degli Este, Ferrara, Provincia di Ferrara,2005

Il Garofalo a Ferrara. Quinto Centenario della nascita, Schede a cura di A.M. Fioravanti Baraldi e A.C. Venturini, 1981

I libri di Orlando innamorato. Schede, Ferrara, Istituto di Studi Rinascimentali, 1987

Le Muse e il Principe. Arte di corte nel Rinascimento padano, Panini, Modena, 1991 (2 voll.)

La zecca di Ferrara in età comunale ed estense. Mostra didattica, Ferrara, 1988

G. Agnelli, V. Giustiniani, Il Museo di Schifanoia in Ferrara. Notizie, Ferrara, 1898 (ristampa anastatica in occasione del primo centenario del Museo Civico di Schifanoia, Modena, Franco Cosimo Panini, 1998)

C. Bassi, Nuova guida di Ferrara, Bovolenta, Ferrara, 2011

M. Bertozzi, La tirannia degli astri. Gli affreschi astrologici di palazzo Schifanoia, Bologna, Cappelli, 1985

M. Borella, E. Domenicali(a cura di), Ferrara, città del Rinascimento e il suo Delta del Po. Un paesaggio culturale, Ferrara, Provincia di Ferrara, s.d. 1998

F. Ceccarelli, La città di Alcina. Architettura e politica alle foci del Po nel tardo Cinquecento, Bologna, Il Mulino, 1998

F. Ceccarelli, M. Folin (a cura di), Delizie estensi. Architetture di villa nel Rinascimento italiano ed europeo,Firenze, Olschki, 2009

C. Cesari, R. Santini, I giardini del duca, “Quaderni de La Pianura”, XI, Ferrara CCIAA, 1981

A. Farinelli Toselli, F. Scafuri, Ferrara VII-XX secolo. Giardini e fortificazioni, Ferrara, 1993

D. Fo, La figlia del papa, Chiarelettere, 2014

C.M. Goldoni, Atlante estense. Mille anni nella storia d’Europa : gli Estensi a Ferrara, Modena, Reggio, Garfagnana e Massa Carrara, Modena, Artestampa, 2011

M.A. Guarini, Compendio historico dell’origine, accrescimento e prerogative delle Chiese, e Luoghi Pii della città e Diocesi di Ferrara, Ferrara, Eredi di Vittorio Baldini, 1621

C. Hope (a cura di), Il regno e l’arte: i camerini di Alfonso I d’Este, terzo duca di Ferrara, Firenze, Olschki, 2012

A. Marchesi, Delizie d’archivio. Regesti e documenti per la storia delle residenze estensi nella Ferrara del Cinquecento, I, Dimore suburbane ed extraurbane, Ferrara, le Immagini, 2011

R. Rimondi, Estensi. Storia e leggende, personaggi e luoghi di una dinastia millenaria, Cirelli & Zanirato, Ferrara, 2004

M.T. Sambin De Norcen, Le ville di Leonello d’Este. Ferrara e le sue campagne agli albori dell’età moderna, Venezia, Marsilio, 2012

C. Toschi Cavaliere, Arte del legno. La tarsia rinascimentale a Ferrara. Strumenti didattici ed itinerari. Schede, Ferrara, Musei Civici di Arte Antica, 1991

R. Varese, Ferrara. Il palazzo di Schifanoia, Bologna, Specimen, 1983

G. Venturi (a cura di), L’uno e l’altro Ariosto in Corte e nelle Delizie, Firenze, Olschki, 2011

G. Venturi, F. Cappelletti (a cura di), Gli Dei a corte. Letteratura e immagini nella Ferrara estense, Firenze, Olschki, 2009

G. Venturi, F. Ceccarelli (a cura di), Delizie in villa. Il giardino rinascimentale e i suoi committenti, Firenze, Olschki, 2008

A.M. Visser Travagli, Palazzo Schifanoia e Palazzina Marfisa a Ferrara, Milano, Electa, 1994

whc.unesco.org/en/list/733/

www.castelloestense.it

www.artecultura.fe.it

www.parcodeltapo.it/pages/it/home.php

Ferrara owes its great historical and cultural achievements to the House of Este, which managed to impose itself on the city in the 13^th century, thus kick-starting a thriving season of unprecedented artistic excellence. The House of Este ruled the city until 1598, when the heirless Ferrara was transferred to the Papacy. The rest of the family had to move to Modena, a city that the Emperor had given over to the House of Este.

The House of Este left its mark on the city’s layout, reshaping its structure and inventing the modern concept of the urban plan. The result is the first city plan in modern Europe, promoted by Ercole I, Duke of Este, and known as Ercolean Addition (1492). Biagio Rossetti worked out the theme of the Renaissance perspective and created an overall urban system that joined the medieval part with the new northern part of the city: new large streets were opened in these areas, at right angles with each other, and stately noble palaces soon began to sprout all along them, such as the famous Palazzo dei Diamanti, and a new square, now called Piazza Ariostea. The Este Castle, which before the Addition was a military fortress that protected the far north of the city, was converted into the impressive dwelling that the Court settled in. The extension of the city went hand in hand with the building of a defensive system that was typical of the Renaissance, with round keeps and tree-lined embankments, and that is still an outstanding specimen of military architecture. The city walls run around the city centre for over nine kilometres, with keeps, bastions and curtain walls added all around it over the centuries.

The diplomatic skills of the House of Este and the intellectual vibrancy of its Court turned Ferrara into a capital of European breadth. In the three centuries during which the House of Este ruled the city, monumental, cultural, administrative and political initiatives were taken to make the city’s look and shape embody the magnificence and stability of its power. The city was redeveloped according to a plan, and reclamations and buildings took place in the properties of the House of Este, which spread out as far as the Po Delta.

Around the old Po Delta, great reclamations took place in the marshlands, and canals protected by towers and fences were built to optimise the rivers and make the land health and tillable. What the House of Este is best known for, though, are the Delizie, residences designed for a travelling Court and for a double purpose: for administration and entertainment. These country residences increased the power of the House of Este on the area and gave it a consistent, distinctive image. The Delizie stood next to streams, in strategic locations along the tight network of waterways around the Delta, and were built for geopolitical reasons: villages surrounded by gardens, courtyards, workshops, offices and housing for the accountants, workers and labourers who tilled the land and looked after the game reserves. The other purpose of the Delizie was to impress people with their architectural beauty, their wide variety of art collections, and the natural settings of their heavenly gardens, to be flaunted before illustrious guests and visiting diplomats. The name Delizia emphasises their aesthetic, celebratory and convivial role by hinting at the pleasant activities that took place there, such as hunts, banquets, plays and parties. The House of Este had the Delizie built in the 15^th and 16^th centuries.

The House of Este highly valued astrology. Scholars tell us that they surrounded themselves with astrologers whom they regularly consulted. This is also proven by the cycle of frescoes in the Salone dei Mesi, The Room of Months, at Palazzo Schifanoia, a city Delizia that can be visited to see an outstanding, extremely innovative mysterious display of astrological figures and symbols.

The House of Este used symbolic figures to portray the family in the coats of arms, paintings, weapons and pennants. Each image had to associate a given positive meaning to the family: the unicorn stood for purity, the diamond for the ruler’s strength, the blindfolded lynx for the ruler’s wisdom, the Hydra and the fence for the redevelopment of the area after the hydraulic works.

Lucrezia Borgia, Duchess of Ferrara, was an important woman who lived during the Italian Renaissance and became a legend. One of her passions was chess, which she was taught by a Spanish man, one of the most famous masters of the time. The rules of the game were changed as a result of the passion of Lucrezia and other noblewomen for chess: the Queen became the strongest piece on the chessboard.

Under the rule of the House of Este, a genuine art of banqueting throve in Ferrara, partly boosted by the efforts of Cristoforo da Messisbugo, the Court’s famous steward. Local chronicles describe the fabulous parties at which delicious and spectacular dishes used to be served.

The House of Este, who had made magnificence an instrument of political power, turned the Court of Ferrara into one of Europe’s greatest centres of cultural innovation and influence. The scholars and artists who worked in Ferrara, such as Biagio Rossetti, Matteo Maria Boiardo, Ludovico Ariosto, Torquato Tasso, were beacons of Italian art and literature. The University – one of the oldest in Italy, founded by Alberto V, Marquis of Este, in 1391 – flourished and attracted illustrious scholars, such as Guarino Veronese, Celio Calcagnini, Nicolaus Copernicus and Paracelsus; Leon Battista Alberti and Giovanni Pico della Mirandola stayed in Ferrara. Such outstanding painters as Cosmè Tura, Francesco del Cossa, Ercole de’ Roberti created a painting school – Officina ferrarese.

Biagio Rossetti (Ferrara, 1447 circa – Ferrara, 1516)

He arrived at the Este Court in 1483 and made the history of architecture as the designer of the city’s urban plan, known as Erculean Addition, which gave the city a modern appearance. He is the author of some of the finest palaces in Ferrara: Palazzo dei Diamanti, Palazzo di Giulio II d’Este, Palazzo Costabili, San Cristoforo alla Certosa, Chiesa di Santa Maria in Vado.

Ludovico Ariosto (Reggio Emilia, 1474 – Ferrara, 1533)

He is Italy’s greatest chivalric epic poet. He wrote in Latin and in the vulgar tongue, but his greatest work is L’Orlando Furioso, the poem he spent a good part of his life writing that tells facts of war entwined with the love affairs of its male and female characters. Ariosto’s biography goes hand in hand with the House of Este, because he was employed by Cardinal Ippolito I d’Este for a long time. In 1518, he went to live at the Court of Ferrara at the service of Alfonso d’Este, Duke of Ferrara, in a managerial-diplomatic capacity.

Torquato Tasso (Sorrento, 1544 – Rome, 1595)

One of the greatest Italian poets of his century, he wrote the chivalric poem Gerusalemme liberata, as well as prose dialogues and a huge mass of letters. He had a difficult, troubled life; he lived and wrote at the Este Court in Ferrara, maybe embarking on a secret love affair with Princess Eleonora d’Este, daughter of Alfonso II, Duke of Ferrara, an affair that inspired many Romantic poems and operas. He ended up confined to the jail of Ospedale di Sant’Anna for seven years, and, after wondering all over Italy, he went to live in Rome where he ended his days.

Leonello d’Este (Ferrara, 1407 – Voghiera, Fe 1450)

He is the quintessential Humanist Prince. The illegitimate child of Nicolò III, Marquis of Ferrara, and Stella dei Tolomei, he received the best education according to the standards of the time: he was educated in the military art by Braccio da Montone, a condottiere, and in the figurative arts by the Humanist poet Guarino Veronese. The Pope entitled him to inherit his father’s title. He founded the first hospital in town, he boosted Studium, the university; he assumedly opened the first Renaissance cabinet and he also paved the way to portrait medals, a successful style that became popular in all the European Courts. Angelo Decembrio states that Leonello wore a different colour for each day in a week, the planetary colour associated with that day, and he called to his Court Leon Battista Alberti – who was commissioned by him to wrote De re aedificatoria – and then Pisanello, Jacopo Bellini, Andrea Mantegna, Piero della Francesca. He died in the Delizia di Belriguardo, in Voghiera.

Bartolino da Novara was the architect and engineer who was commissioned by Nicolò II d’Este to design the Este Castle in Ferrara, dedicated to St Michael, started in 1385. Bartolino da Novara also designed the Castle of St George in Mantova, built between 1395 and 1406 and home to the House of Gonzaga since the mid-15^th century. Isabella d’Este, daughter of Ercole I d’Este, Duke of Ferrara, and Eleanor of Aragon, married Francesco Gonzaga in 1490, thus becoming the Marquise of Mantova and binding both dynasties together. The Camera Picta or Bridal Chamber frescoed by Andrea Mantegna is in the north-east tower of the Castle. He decorated the Gonzaga Court with the elegance and love for art that he had been imbued with while at the Este Court. In the Erculean Addition, part of the city is theoretically planned, the plan is put in practice according to the standards of the ideal city and neatly laid out like Sabbioneta, which was planned by Vespasiano Gonzaga.

Cardinal Ippolito II d’Este was the client and the lord of Villa d’Este, after his appointment as Governor of Tivoli. He was the son of Alfonso I d’Este, Duke of Ferrara, and Lucrezia Borgia. The gardens of the villa are a masterpiece of Renaissance engineering and an outstanding example of an Italian garden; the gardens are dotted with fountains, tanks and waterfalls with an impressively wide range of spectacular water features. The ornamentation of the architectural complex and the gardens at Villa d’Este were based on an iconographic plan that celebrates the virtues of strength and chastity of both Cardinal Ippolito and the House of Este.

Transferred, past participle of transfer:  Transfer. The conveyance of an asset, a title, a right from a party to another. In the history of Ferrara, that is the moment in time (1598) in which the Duchy went back to the Papal State.

City plan, a plan for the development of a city.

At right angles. Two elements intersecting to form four right angles. Often used to describe perpendicular streets.

Reclamation. Draining wetland to make fit for growing crops or building houses.

Aesthetic, concerning beauty, beautiful things.

Convivial, from the Latin convivium, banquet; a group of people gathering to share a meal.

Condottiere, the leader of a group of mercenary soldiers. The troops of mercenaries, professional armies hired by kings and lords for money to increase their military power, became widespread in the Middle Ages.

Steward, a man who supervised the kitchen for a noble family, taking care of the accounts, as well as the cooking and appearance of the food, especially at parties and banquets. They were not regarded as simple servants, but as members of the Court.

Bastion, noun, a bastion or rampart is a defensive building used to protect a city in the modern age. The difference between a bastion and a medieval tower is that it was as high as the walls. It was usually built at the corners of a defensive building, in a variety of shapes.

Travelling, that moves between places.

Pennant, noun, a flag or a banner.

Fence, noun, a sort of paling made of thinner wood poles, nailed and entwined to willow branches to support a large riverbank.