Temples over resorts, local life over landmarks.

Italy, top to toe · eight stops, eight pieces of history

1. 

   01 / 08

   Milan

   The Last Supper, Leonardo

   Leonardo painted it on a dry wall instead of in true fresco, and it has been fragile ever since: the last restoration took 21 years. In August 1943 a bomb hit the refectory; the sandbagged wall stood.

   of wall, painted 1495–98

   4.6 × 8.8 m

   per visit

   15 min

2. 

   02 / 08

   Venice

   The horses of St Mark

   Four horses of almost pure copper, taken from Constantinople in 1204, taken again by Napoleon in 1797 and brought back in 1815. The originals moved inside the basilica in the 1980s; the ones on the façade are copies.

   taken from Constantinople

   1204

   islands under the city

   118

3. 

   03 / 08

   Bologna

   Giambologna's Neptune

   Cast between 1563 and 1566, 3.35 m of bronze over the main square, cleaned in 2017. Walk on under the porticoes, past a university that has taught since 1088.

   of porticoes

   62 km

   university founded

   1088

4. 

   04 / 08

   Florence

   Michelangelo's David

   Carved from 1501 to 1504 out of a block two sculptors had already given up on. He stood in the Piazza della Signoria until 1873, then moved indoors to the Accademia; the one outside is a copy.

   of marble

   5.17 m

   finished

   1504

5. 

   05 / 08

   Pisa

   The lean that saves it

   It tilted by the third floor, in 1178. A pause of nearly a century let the clay settle, and the same soft soil now keeps the tower from resonating in earthquakes. It has ridden out at least four strong ones since 1280.

   of lean

   3.97°

   steps to the bells

   296

6. 

   06 / 08

   Cinque Terre

   Pesto, on its home coast

   Fishing villages stacked on cliffs, tied together by the 12 km Blue Trail. Thousands of kilometres of dry-stone terraces hold up the vineyards. Eat Monterosso anchovies, pesto on its home coast, and focaccia; locals dip it in their morning cappuccino.

   Blue Trail

   12 km

   of dry-stone walls

   6,700 km

7. 

   07 / 08

   Rome

   The Capitoline Wolf

   The she-wolf of Rome's founding myth was long taken for Etruscan, 5th century BC. Lab dating says she was cast between 1021 and 1153 AD; the twins were added in the late 1400s. Pope Sixtus IV gave her to the people of Rome in 1471.

   given to the people of Rome

   1471

   when she was really cast

   c. 1100

8. 

   08 / 08

   Naples

   The Farnese Hercules

   A Roman copy signed by Glykon of Athens, after a lost bronze by Lysippos. Dug up in Rome's Baths of Caracalla in 1546 and moved to Naples in 1787, he rests on his club in the archaeological museum, which also keeps the finds from Pompeii.

   of marble

   3.17 m

   found in Rome

   1546