Things to See in Bergamo | 2 Monuments & Landmarks

All the monuments in Bergamo

The landmarks and masterpieces worth planning a day around.

Bergamo's Venetian ramparts carrying the upper town's edge

Mura Venete di BergamoUNESCOVenetian Walls of BergamoSix kilometers of ramparts, fourteen bastions, UNESCO listing since 2017, sunset promenade views to MilanVenice ringed Bergamo with six kilometers of bastioned walls between 1561 and 1588, a defense so overbuilt it was never once tested in the siege it was designed for. Fourteen bastions and four gates still trace the hilltop almost intact, and UNESCO added the circuit to its Venetian defensive-works listing in 2017, alongside similar walls in Peschiera and Palmanova. Today the ramparts are the city's favorite sunset promenade, a flat walking path with the Po plain falling away on one side and Città Alta's rooftops on the other, running as far as Milan's skyline on the clearest days.Plan the visit

Citta Alta di BergamoBergamo Citta AltaFunicular through the Venetian walls, Piazza Vecchia, Colleoni Chapel facade, Basilica of Santa Maria MaggioreBergamo keeps an essentially complete Renaissance town sitting on its hilltop, sealed inside the Venetian walls and reached, most memorably, by a funicular that has climbed since 1887 through the ramparts themselves, its two orange cars gliding past centuries-old stonework on the way up. At the top, Piazza Vecchia gathers the civic library, the twelfth-century Torre Civica and a Renaissance fountain into a composition regularly called the most beautiful square in Italy, with little serious argument. Just off it, the Colleoni Chapel's polychrome marble facade and the Basilica of Santa Maria Maggiore's Baroque interior round out a hilltop that manages to feel both monumental and, at aperitivo hour, entirely lived-in.

The Bergamo guide

More within reach

Monuments a day trip away, elsewhere in Lombardy.

More in Lombardy