Arengario (Monza)

Monza - Arengario, west side

The Arengario (“town house”), sometimes also called Broletto , in the northern Italian city of Monza is the most important medieval secular building in the city. The ground floor, open on all sides, served as a market hall and public space for court hearings; Council meetings were held on the closed upper floor. Its architecture is clearly based on the Palazzo della Ragione in Milan .

Building history

Although exact data on the building history are missing, the building can be dated to the 13th century because of its architectural references to the Palazzo della Ragione in Milan. In 1330 the south wall of the building was given a covered balcony ( loggia ), which was popularly called la parlera because it was from here that city decrees and public notices were read out. A bell tower was added to the building in the same century . The former external staircase was only dismantled in 1904; From then on, access to the upper floor was via the stairs in the tower.

architecture

The ground floor consists of three from dressed stone erected rows of pillars , the arches of brick are brick; the bright marble stones inserted in the arcade arches provide visual variety. Something similar is repeated in the blind arches of the three-part windows, divided by small columns, on the upper floor, which is entirely made of brick and ends with a small round-arched frieze below the eaves . While the outer walls of the building appear otherwise unstructured and flat, the tower, which is also made of brick, has a significantly richer design with corner and central pilaster strips and horizontal cornices , which are additionally emphasized by light natural stone friezes . At the top the tower ends in a wreath of dovetail battlements; an octagonal pointed helmet crowns the building.