The elliptic Piazza Anfiteatro or Piazza del Mercato, is easily Lucca's most unusual town square. Created during the Middle Ages, it owes both its name and its irregular shape to the 1st or 2nd century Roman amphitheatre that once stood here. |
The stones of this ancient construction were, over time, taken from here and used to create many of the city's other landmarks. Although the amphitheatre was dismantled piece by piece, its outline could still be made out as late as the 1830s, when local architect Lorenzo Nottolini was commissioned to turn what was then a somewhat ill conceived housing estate into a marketplace. |
Nottolini cleared all the buildings that were occupying the more central locatons of the square and restored the original oval shape of the amphitheatre. Two entrances were added, exceedingly narrow ones, in accordance with Lucca's street plan. The surrounding medieval buildings, whose foundations stand in the amphitheatre's former arcades, remained. |
