The Palace that met Napoleon

Situated in Via Montà, a stretch of road that rises in Via Palma from Porta Montà, joining the San Romolo valley to the Pigna district, the palace, particularly severe in its external appearance and equipped with a large entrance hall, was built in the middle of the modern age by the noble Sapia family, who were then among the city's major landowners together with the Boreas.

The building is also noteworthy for having hosted, on the evening of 7 September 1794, the young brigadier general Napoleon Bonaparte, who dined in the palace with the landlord Gio Batta Sapia Rossi, Tomaso Borea d'Olmo and the two officers Abbot and Prost. Bonaparte's stay at the Sapia residence is recorded on a plaque placed beside the entrance door of the palace in January 1982 by the Municipality's Tourism Department as a permanent reminder of the historic event.

(sources: text by Andrea Gandolfo; images from private archive)