Palazzo Guiccioli in the centre of Ravenna.

Palazzo Guiccioli in the centre of Ravenna. Hotels near Palazzo Guiccioli.

Photo:1)the facade of Palazzo Guiccioli,via Cavour,2)Palazzo Guiccioli,3)entrance,via Cavour,4)Portrait of Teresa Gamba Guiccioli,5)Portrait of Lord George Gordon Byron(from "Byron e Teresa" Natale Graziani, Ed.Mursia), 6)Farm Guiccioli in Mandriole of Ravenna, where Anita Gabibaldi died

"a.a. in e.", this was how  George Gordon Byron signed his letters to Teresa Guiccioli: "Lover, friend for eternity ".

Those promises still seem to ring out in the decadent atmosphere of this 17th century palazzo, where the poet lived between 1820 and 1821.

Lord Byron was at the time the guest of count Alessandro Guiccioli, who was courting his young consort Teresa and a co-conspirator with her brother, Pietro Gamba, belonging to the Carboneria movement.

He occupied the rooms on the first floor, together with seven servants, two dogs, two cats and three peacocks not to mention a goose and a monkey; his seven horses were housed in the stables and each day he would go for a ride in the pine forest.

"I have been staying here for four weeks having left Venice a month ago ", wrote Byron in a letter to his London editor. "I have come to see my friend Contessa Guiccioli, who is, and has been fairly ill … She is only 17 years old, but she is not very strong … Her husband (she is his third wife) is the richest man in Ravenna and all of Romagna; although he is by no means the youngest as he is over 60: but well preserved ".

The fierce passion of Byron seem to contrast the austere and stark aspect of this facade, which reflects the character of the Guiccioli family, an ancient branch of the Ravenna aristocracy, and in particular the character and interests of the count Alessandro.

He was the main collaborator of the French on their arrival (1796), he was responsible for a major confiscation and sales initiative of the vast landed estate which was the result of the Napoleonic suppression of monasteries and convents (1797).
 

This resulted in the transformation of the economic and social situation of the city: he got rid of the religious corporations; he boosted the power of the pro-French aristocracy, which was mainly based on the control of the landed properties.

This helped the emergence of a bourgeois class capable of purchasing the confiscated goods, thereby helping the same to acquire a greater economic and political standing.

Prof. Gianni Morelli

The pleasure of fine accommodation in the centre of Ravenna: we recommend the Fabbri hotels for a pleasant stay as follows:

The Centrale Byron Hotel, 3-star hotel in the centre of Ravenna, close to the main momuments;

The Bisanzio Hotel, 4-star hotel in the centre of Ravenna, close to the main momuments;

Once you have reached the hotel and parked your car, forget it and walk everywhere, because everything is within walking distance. 


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