The world is full of wonders and Europe is a continent full of very romantic places where you can enjoy and one of them is undoubtedly Italy.
One of the best wonders I have had the joy of seeing with my partner is the:
Pisa Tower (Torre di Pisa)
Also it receives the name of The Leaning Tower of Pisa (in Italian: Torre pendente di Pisa), is located in the Italian region of Tuscany. the purpose of it is to be the bell tower (independent) surprising and I did not expect it, such a peculiar work is a bell tower! of the cathedral of the Italian city of Pisa and instead of building it next to the Basilica, like most of the churches, it was built next to it; It is very particular and known throughout the world for its inclination that curiously is unplanned involuntary. This is the third oldest structure in the Plaza de la Catedral (Piazza del Duomo), after the cathedral and the Baptistery of Pisa.
Google Italy Map
This tower is a clear example of the Romanesque Pisan architectural style, with its construction in white marble and its exterior ornamentation with galleries of columns that are twisted into a spiral, it is very striking. The height of the tower is 8 floors, that is to say if we speak of measures of 55.86 meters from the ground on the low side and 56.67 meters on the high side. The width of the walls at the base is 2.44 meters, with 296 or 294 steps, where the seventh floor has two steps less on the staircase facing north. Before the restoration work carried out between 1990 and 2001, the tower was inclined at an angle of 5.5 ° but now the tower is tilted to about 4 °. This means that the upper part of the tower moves horizontally 3.9 meters from the center.
The tower suffers a phenomenon that in Engineering is called Differential Structures Settlement
The differential settlement refers to the unequal placement of the pillars of a building or the foundations that can cause damage to the structure. The damage occurs when the foundation sinks in different areas at different times. Source
And it is those professional architects who through the years with great astuteness and intelligence developed stabilization mechanisms so that the construction started in 1173 did not collapse.
It can be said that the tilt of the tower began during construction in the twelfth century, this due to the construction of a base in the ground too unstable to support the weight of the structure. Inevitably, the inclination increased in the decades before the structure was completed in the 14th century, and gradually increased until the structure stabilized (and the inclination was partially corrected) through efforts at the end of the 20th century and the beginning of the 21st.
About the Construction
It is incredible but nowadays it is not resolved who participated in the construction of this wonderful architecture, what is known is that the initial architect of the Tower was Bonanno Pisano. But they were also recognized as possible authors to Diotisalvi (for being the architect of the Baptistery), and to Beduino, (because the decoration of the tower is similar to other works carried out by this architect).
The construction of the tower occurred in three stages and lasted approximately 199 years. Work on the ground floor of the white marble bell tower began on August 14, 1173 during a period of military success and prosperity. This ground floor is a blind arcade articulated by dedicated columns, with classical Corinthian capitals
The tower began to sink after the construction reached the second floor in the year 1178. It is believed that its base was only three meters deep and in a weak and unstable subsoil, that is to say that at first it was a design defective. The construction stopped for almost a century, because the Republic of Pisa was almost continuously in battles with Genoa, Lucca and Florence. This in turn was an advantage as this allowed time for the underlying soil to settle, because otherwise the tower would almost certainly have collapsed. In the year 1198, the clocks were temporarily installed on the third floor of the unfinished building.
In the year 1272, construction was resumed under Giovanni di Simone, known as the architect of the Camposanto. In an effort to compensate for the inclination, the engineers built upper floors with one side higher than the other. That's why the tower has a curved appearance. Due to the loss in the battle of Meloria, this time by the Genoese, construction stopped again in the year 1284.
The seventh floor was completed in 1319. The chamber where the bells are located was finally added in the year 1372. It was built by Tommaso di Andrea Pisano, who managed to harmonize the Gothic elements of the bell chamber with the Romanesque style of the tower. The great thing about this structure is that there are seven bells, one for each note of the musical major scale. The largest was installed in the year 1655.
After a phase of structural strengthening (during the years 1990 to 2001) the tower undergoes a gradual restoration of the surface, to repair the damage all visible damage, mainly corrosion and blackening due to the age of the tower and its exposure to wind and rain.
Curiosities and Stories
It is said that the inhabitants of Pisa devised to build the Tower of Pisa in order to demonstrate that they were the richest and most educated citizens of the time. although it was started in a disastrous way they managed to create a powerful Republic and several centuries were the power of the Mediterranean.
It is said that Galileo Galilei used the tower for one of his experiments, throwing two cannonballs from different masses from the tower to demonstrate that the descent speed was independent of its masses (a large stone ball and a smaller one, for show that the big one did not fall faster).
During the Second World War, it was almost attacked by US armies, because there were strong suspicions that the Germans were using the tower as an observation post, this attack was stopped because the army sergeant sent was fascinated by the beauty of the cathedral and its campaline, in this way it avoided being destroyed.
We tried to restore the tower trying to take it to a vertical orientation or failing to prevent it from falling but most of those efforts failed in fact some of them worsened the inclination. On February 27, 1964, the government of Italy asked for help to repair a little the tilt of the tower to prevent it from collapsing, but that this restoration will not affect much its inclination only what is necessary since this has been of promotion to the industry tourist of Pisa
The inclination of the tower has been of inspiration to many engineers, mathematicians and historians who in their eagerness for studies met in the Azores Islands in order to analyze stabilization methods, concluded that the inclination increases with the combination of the softer foundations on the underside.
In 1987 it was declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO along with the neighboring Cathedral, the Baptistery and the cemetery that are included in the Piazza del Duomo
- For security reasons on January 7, 1990, it was closed to the public. Some touches were given to stabilize it a little and avoid an eminent collapse: the bells were removed to relieve a little weight, the cables were wrapped around the third level and anchored a few hundred meters away. Some apartments and houses on the way to the tower were evicted for safety. One of the possible solutions chosen to avoid collapse was to straighten it slightly to a more secure angle by eliminating 38 cubic meters of earth below the high end, this straightened it by about 45 centimeters, returning to the slope it had in the year 1838 After a decade of studies, stabilization efforts and corrective reconstruction the tower returned to open to the public on December 15, 2001 and so much effort paid off by declaring stable for a few more years. In total, around 70 metric tons of earth were eliminated, which made possible its stabilization.
- Finally in May 2008, the engineers who worked hard in the tower announced that their stabilization was so successful that for the first time in history they had stopped moving and said that it would be stable for at least 200 years.
Structural technical information
The Tower is structurally and architecturally described as follows:
- The Elevation of Piazza del Duomo: It has approximately 2 meters
- Height from the ground floor: It measures 55,863 meters, that is 8 floors
- Height from the floor of the base: Measures 58.36 meters
- Outside diameter of the base: has 15,484 meters
- Internal diameter of the base: It is 7,368 meters
- Angle of inclination: Currently 3.97 degrees or 3.9 meters from the vertical side
- Weight: its approximate weight is 14,700 metric tons (16,200 short tons)
- ** Thickness of the walls at the base: ** it is 2.44 meters thick
- Total number of bells: There are 7 bells in total, tuned to music scale and clockwise. The bells have the following characteristics:
- 1st bell: L'Assunta, was molded in the year 1654 by Giovanni Pietro Orlandi, its weight is 3,620 kg.
- 2nd bell: Il Crocifisso, was launched in the year 1572 by Vincenzo Possenti, its weight is2,462 kg
- 3rd bell: San Ranieri, was issued between the years 1719 - 1721 by Giovanni Andrea Moreni, its weight is 1,448 kg
- 4th bell: La Terza (is the 1st small), was placed in the year 1473, with a weight of 300 kg
- 5th bell: La Pasquereccia or La Giustizia, finally melted in 1262 by Lotteringo, weighing 1,014 kg
- 6th bell: Il Vespruccio (it is the 2nd small one), and it was placed in the XIV century and again in the year 1501 by Nicola di Jacopo, and its weight is 1,000 kg.
- 7th bell: Dal Pozzo, placed in the year 1606 and again in the year 2004, its weight of 652 kg
- Number of steps to the top: to fully climb 296 stairs
- About the fifth bell: The name Pasquareccia comes from Easter, because it used to sound especially on Easter day. Another curious fact is that this bell is older than the bell chamber itself, and comes from the Vergata tower in Palazzo Pretorio in Pisa, where it was called La Giustizia (Justice). The bell was tolled to announce the executions of criminals and traitors, including Count Ugolino in 1289. A new bell was installed in the bell tower at the end of the 18th century to replace the broken Pascualccia.
More photos of the Tower
Definitely see this work so old, touch it, upload it is one of the experience that every person in your life should live, without any doubt, it is also inevitable not to feel the emotion of having had greater privilege and being well accompanied with the most important person in my life, it's really priceless.
Our madness when wanting to stop the Tower:
Cathedral
An unforgettable experience that I want to experience again soon
Information analyzed from the following sources:
All the photos that do not indicate the source are from my author
Photos taken from mobile device
