This morning we toured Sforza Castle. This fortress and castle was originally built by the Visconti family who ruled Milan from the mid 14th to the mid 15th centuries. It was started in the 1360s. The Viscontis were replaced as the lords of Milan by the Sforza family who took over the castle and rebuilt and enlarged it until it reached its current size. Here we are in the main square of the fort. You can see the central tower over the main gate and one of the four towers that guard the corners. This is a large fort with three squares (they're not really square but they call them that anyway). When the Sforzas were having this castle finished they hired a lot of Italian artist to do the decorating. Among them was Leonardo da Vinci and Michelangelo. Leonardo did a lot of ceilings as well as paintings here during the time that he was staying away from Venice for "heath" reasons,
Here we are in one of the smaller courtyards and you can see more of the walls and another of the watch towers. The 2 on the city side are round but the 2 on the other side are square.
Here is the tomb of Bernabo Visconti. Pretty elaborate.
Here is the tomb of his wife. Not quite so elaborate. Her family name was La Scala. They dedicated a church to her that ended up bearing her name. When they tore down the church to build the new opera house is became known as Teatro alla Scala after the church.
The fortress is now used as a museum and they have a lot of Roman and medieval art and artifacts such as this church decoration of Madonna and Child.
This is a cover of the tomb from some medieval knight.
As well as suits of armor and weapons.
Here is a small painting that Leonardo did.
And here is the ceiling of the castle chapel that he did.
Probably the most important piece of art is the last piece that Michelangelo worked on. It's a version of the Pieta but it was never finished as he died before he could complete it.
When Napoleon conquered Italy in the late 18th century, he had this triumphal arch built to commemorate his victories. It is older than the one in Paris.
After this we rode the tour bus back to the Piazza Duomo for some free time and to grab lunch. We had heard about older church ruins that were under the Piazza and so went to see them. Before the Duomo was built there were 2 smaller churches on the site with a Baptistery between them. We entered the Duomo and then took a flight of stairs down under the Piazza where they have been excavating these ancient ruins. Here are the remains of the Baptistery where, in the 4th Century, St. Ambrose baptized St. Augustine.
And here is all that remains of the apse walls of the Basilica Di St. Tecla,
After this we grabbed some lunch and then started heading out of Milan but first we stopped to see this absolutely enormous bronze sculpture of a horse that Leonardo da Vinci had done. You can get an idea of how large it was by noting how small the gentleman looks who is standing next to it.
That was it for Milan. Next stop is the city of Como on the shores of Lake Como.
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