caption 1: The Camposanto of Pisa: cemetery, reliquary, museumdetails

The Camposanto of Pisa can be considered one of the foremost Italian artistic places and already in the Eighteenth century travellers, artists and men of letters considered it a privileged destination. During the last [19th] century, its immortal fame started to decline partly because of the growing celebrity of [the] leaning Tower but also for some adverse vicissitudes, whose effects have been amended by the recent restorations.

The Camposanto was the last monument to be built in the Piazza del Duomo and its long marble wall delimits the northern perimeter of the Piazza. The building was founded in 1277 in order to collect the ancient Roman sarcophagi, since then spread all around the cathedral and re-used as tombs by the most eminent citizens of Pisa. the archbishop Federico Visconti intended the Camposanto to be a “large and decorous, isolated and secluded” place; this was among the first Medieval christian architectures devoted to the worship of the deads.