The Intact Walled City of Tuscany — Cycling the Ramparts above Puccini's Hometown
Lucca's Renaissance walls — four kilometres of brick ramparts 30 metres wide, completed in 1650 — survive perfectly intact and are now a tree-lined promenade cyclists and walkers share above the city's red-tiled rooftops. Inside the walls, Romanesque churches, the oval Piazza Anfiteatro (built over a Roman amphitheatre), and the Torre Guinigi with its rooftop oak trees make Lucca one of the most harmonious small cities in Italy. Giacomo Puccini was born here in 1858, and his house is now a museum.
Lucca was a Roman colony (Luca) founded in 180 BCE and became one of the most important cities in medieval Tuscany — the seat of the Lombard kings and later a wealthy independent commune that sustained its independence through commercial astuteness rather than military power. The city's silk and banking industries made it prosperous enough to complete the great walls, which proved their worth when Lucca remained unoccupied during the turbulent centuries when Florence and Siena fought repeatedly over the surrounding countryside.