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Castiglione Olona is a town and ''
Castiglione Olona is a town and ''comune
A (; : , ) is an administrative division of Italy, roughly equivalent to a township or municipality. It is the third-level administrative division of Italy, after regions () and provinces (). The can also have the City status in Italy, titl ...
'' in the province of Varese
The province of Varese () is a Provinces of Italy, province in the Lombardy region of Italy. Its capital is the city of Varese (population of 80,857 inhabitants), but its largest city is Busto Arsizio. The headquarters of AgustaWestland, the compa ...
, in Lombardy
The Lombardy Region (; ) is an administrative regions of Italy, region of Italy that covers ; it is located in northern Italy and has a population of about 10 million people, constituting more than one-sixth of Italy's population. Lombardy is ...
. As of 31 December 2015, it has a population of 7,753 inhabitants.
The area of the town with the greatest tourist attractions is the historic center.
The entrance to the historic center is through two gates in the ancient medieval walls, both on the street Via Roma: the Western Gate, for the people arriving from the medieval bridge over the Olona River, and the Eastern Gate, for those arriving from the modern part of the town.
History
The town of Castiglione Olona rose around the fifth century CE under theRoman Empire
The Roman Empire ruled the Mediterranean and much of Europe, Western Asia and North Africa. The Roman people, Romans conquered most of this during the Roman Republic, Republic, and it was ruled by emperors following Octavian's assumption of ...
domain. Consequently, the Lombards entered and took possession of the village until the Castiglioni family became sole proprietor of the land around 1000 AC. The family engaged in many battles for the rule of the lands so they had walls built all around the village to protect themselves from enemies. Today only a small part of the walls near the fortress is visitable. In 1422, cardinal Branda da Castiglione
Branda da Castiglione (4 February 1350 in Castiglione Olona – 3 February 1443 in Castiglione Olona) was an early Renaissance humanism, Italian humanist, a papal diplomat and a Roman Catholic cardinal.
Early career
He was born to a Milanese nob ...
obtained the permission from Pope Martin V
Pope Martin V (; ; January/February 1369 – 20 February 1431), born Oddone Colonna, was the head of the Catholic Church and ruler of the Papal States from 11 November 1417 to his death in February 1431. His election effectively ended the We ...
to build the church of Collegiata (Santi Stefano e Lorenzo); the church contains frescoes attributed to Masolino.
In the town, the 15th and 16th century palace of cardinal Branda now serves as a museum, still contains a chapel and a number of frescoed walls, some attributed to Sienese painter Vecchietta.
The church of the Santissimo Corpo di Cristo, also known as the church of Villa, is located in G. Garibaldi square in the historic center. The building, constructed between 1437 and 1444 on the site of an ancient oratory of the 13th century dedicated to the Holy Sepulchre, declares a close descent from Brunelleschi's architectural models.
Twin towns — sister cities
Castiglione Olona is twinned with: *Étupes
Étupes () is a commune in the Doubs department in the Bourgogne-Franche-Comté region in eastern France.
Population
See also
* Communes of the Doubs department
The following is a list of the 563 communes of the Doubs department of Fran ...
, France
Sport
*The Varesina stadium complex and Stadio Comunale di Venegono is home to Varesina Sport CV SSD football team. *The Moto Club Castiglione Olona organisedmotorcycle speedway
Motorcycle speedway, usually referred to simply as speedway, is a motorcycle sport involving four and sometimes up to six riders competing over four clockwise, anti-clockwise laps of an oval circuit. The motorcycles are specialist machines that ...
and the track on Via Asiago. It hosted important events, including qualifying rounds of the Speedway World Team Cup
The Speedway World Team Cup was an annual motorcycle speedway, speedway event held each year in different countries. The competition started in 1960 and was replaced with the Speedway World Cup in 2001.
Format
From 1960 until 1985, each team c ...
in 1976 and 1980 and a qualifying round of the Speedway World Championship
The World Championship of Speedway is an international competition between the highest-ranked motorcycle speedway riders of the world, run under the auspices of the Fédération Internationale de Motocyclisme (FIM). The first official championsh ...
in 1978.
The site of the former track is the Varesina Sports Center, which today has two synthetic football pitches and a smaller covered indoor pitch.
References