Italy's most underrated port city — Christopher Columbus was born here, pesto was invented here, and the Caruggi medieval alleyways hide Europe's largest old town in a labyrinth of portals and marble palazzi too narrow for cars
Genoa (Genova) is a city of 570,000 on the Ligurian Riviera, Italy's largest seaport and once one of the great Maritime Republics. The Caruggi — a UNESCO World Heritage medieval core of narrow alleyways rising up to 14 storeys — is Europe's largest medieval city centre, dense with Gothic portals, aristocratic palazzi, and street-food vendors. The Via Garibaldi (Strada Nuova) contains the highest concentration of Renaissance palazzi on a single street in Italy, now housing world-class art collections. The Porto Antico holds Europe's largest aquarium (600 species), redesigned by Renzo Piano — G…
Genoa's maritime republic (La Superba — 'the Proud') was one of the wealthiest states in medieval Europe, financing expeditions from Cyprus to the Black Sea and running the most sophisticated banking system of the 13th–15th centuries. The Casa di San Giorgio (founded 1407) is considered the world's first public bank. Christopher Columbus was born in Genoa in 1451 — his house survives in the Caruggi — and was backed by Genoese banking networks when he sailed under the Spanish Crown. The republic's influence stretched from Corsica to Crimea. Genoa declined after the Ottoman conquest of Constant…