The city of Lucca was built in unknown time on the border between the Etruscan and Ligurian lands precisely on a piece of land reclaimed from the river to the then Auser, subsequently renamed Serchio. The particularity of those marshy lands are the basis of the environmental characteristics of the area, often subject to flooding, and its very name, Luk, which means in Celtic-Ligurian: "place of swamps." The reclamation work was begun in the early Middle Ages and the diversion of the river to the sea the city Auser improved dramatically. From historical texts we learn that in 180 BC Lucca became a Latin colony even though his influence and his reputation is far less than that of nearby Pisa and Luni. Lucca then suffers an invasion by the Goths, Byzantines and the Lombards in 570 AD penetrate the city of Lucca and convert to Christianity. At that time the city of Lucca flourish in all its aspects, religious, economic, and political and thanks also to the famous Via Francigena-Rome from Lucca to other European cities and Italian, thereby allowing the expansion in trade and culture. In the ninth century and was conquered by the Franks was born on the Marquis of Tuscany. E 'in this period that begins to accrue in Lucca desire for independence; rise the first rifts with Pisa, and the first structures of self-government. Lucca in 1314 fell under the dominion of the Lord of Pisa Uguccione Faggiola and is subsequently released by the family of Castruccio Castracani Antelminelli, who became, as a result of his conquests, Duke of Lucca, Pisa, Pistoia, Luni and Volterra. Lucca then established an alliance with Charles V and the same year suffered a conspiracy of Poggi and the revolt of the beggars (1531-1532) and lived a period of religious crisis. In 1628 founded the "Golden Book", a collection of the most illustrious names of the noble families which were chosen among the leaders but with the conquest by the French in 1799, the republic collapsed. By the will of Napoleon, the city became the principality of Elisa Bonaparte and Felice Baciocchi. Collapse of the Napoleonic Empire, the city was entrusted to the Duchess Maria Luisa of Bourbon, and then to his son Charles Louis, in 1847 the city passed into the hands of the Grand Duchy of Tuscany. In 1860 he joined the Kingdom of Italy. Citizens were famous Lucchese Luigi Boccherini, composer of the eighteenth century, the composer Alfredo Catalani (1854-1893) and Giacomo Puccini (1858-1924). |
