Lucca city centre

The city centre, with a wealth of monuments and beautiful retreats is just 50 minutes from Florence.

An attractive city of art in the heart of Tuscany, Lucca is also famous the world over for having been the town of birth of Giacomo Puccini and Luigi Boccherini. Lucca has a charming and characteristic old city centre and you simply cannot afford to miss the ancient medieval towers, the splendid Romanesque and Pisa-style churches, the Roman amphitheatre and the old city walls and ramparts, along which you can still walk.

From here, it is also easy to get to other major tourist attractions like Pisa, Florence, Siena, the Garfagnana region, the Versilia region and the Apuan Alps.

The walls around the old town remained intact as the city expanded and modernized, unusual for cities in the region. As the walls lost their military importance, they became a pedestrian promenade which encircled the old town, although they were used for a number of years in the 20th century for racing cars. They are still fully intact today; each of the four principal sides is lined with a different tree species.

The academy of sciences (1584) is the most famous of several academies and libraries.

The Casa di Puccini is open to the public. At nearby Torre del Lago there is a Puccini opera festival every year in July/August. Puccini had a house there.

There are many richly built medieval basilica-form churches in Lucca with rich arcaded facades and campaniles, a few as old as the 8th century.

Piazza dell'Anfiteatro

Piazza Napoleone

Piazza San Michele

Duomo di San Martino (St Martin's Cathedral)

The Ducal Palace (The original project was begun by Bartolomeo Ammannati in 1577-1582, and continued by Filippo Juvarra in the 18th century.)

The ancient Roman amphitheatre

Church of San Michele in Foro

Basilica di San Frediano

Torre delle ore ("The Clock Tower")

Casa and Torre Guinigi

Museo Nazionale Guinigi

Museo e Pinacoteca Nazionale

Orto Botanico Comunale di Lucca, a botanical garden dating from 1820

Palazzo Pfanner

Church of San Giorgio in the locality of Brancoli, built in the late 12th century. It has a nave and two aisles with a single apse, and a bell tower in Lombard-Romanesque style ranked amongst the most beautiful in northern Italy. The interior houses a massive ambo (1194) with four columns mounted on notable sculptures of lions. Also having notable medieval decoration is the octagonal baptismal font. The altar is supported by six small columns with human figures.

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