The capital of the marquisate and La Castiglia
At the foot of the Alps, in the plain south of Turin, with Monviso rising behind it, Saluzzo is one of the most beautiful and best preserved historic towns in Piedmont. From the twelfth to the sixteenth century it was the capital of the Marquisate of Saluzzo, an independent state ruled by the del Vasto marquises, which had its golden age in the fifteenth century under Ludovico I and Ludovico II, patrons of the arts, before being annexed by France and then, in 1601, by the Savoy.
The upper town, the "Salus", climbs the hill with steep cobbled lanes, Gothic and Renaissance houses and palaces, and churches. At the top stands the Castiglia, the castle of the marquises, transformed in the nineteenth century into a prison, closed in 1992 and now home to the Museum of the Prison Memory and the Museum of the Marquisate. Among the other monuments are the Gothic church of San Giovanni, with the tomb of the marquis Ludovico II and a beautiful cloister, the Casa Cavassa, a Renaissance noble house with frescoes and a museum, the Torre Civica, with a view over the roofs and the mountains, and the late Gothic cathedral in the lower town. Saluzzo was the birthplace of Silvio Pellico, the patriot and author of "Le mie prigioni".
Tip: in autumn Saluzzo hosts a great antiques fair; the abbey of Staffarda and the castle of Manta, with its frescoed hall, are a few kilometres away.
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