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Novara

Comune in Piedmont, Italy

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Panorama of Novara
Alessandro Vecchi · CC BY-SA 3.0

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Through Italy and Switzerland

It is an important crossroads for commercial traffic along the routes from Milan to Turin and from Genoa to Switzerland.

Novara lies between the streams Agogna and Terdoppio in northeastern Piedmont, 50 km (31 mi) from Milan and 95 km (59 mi) from Turin. It is only 15 km (9.3 mi) from the river Ticino, which marks the border with the Lombardy region.

History

Novara was founded around 89 BC by the Romans, when the local Gauls obtained Roman citizenship. Its name is formed from Nov, meaning "new", and Aria, the name the Cisalpine Gauls used for the surrounding region.

Ancient Novaria, which dates to the time of the Ligures and the Celts, was a municipium and was situated on the road from Vercellae (Vercelli) to (Mediolanum) Milan. Its position on perpendicular roads (still intact today) dates to the time of the Romans. After the city was destroyed in 386 by Magnus Maximus for having supported his rival Valentinian II, it was rebuilt by Theodosius I. Subsequently, it was sacked by Radagaisus (in 405) and Attila (in 452).

Under the Lombards, Novara became a duchy; under Charles the Fat, a countship. Novara came to enjoy the rights of a free imperial city. In 1110, it was conquered by Henry V and destroyed, but in 1167 it joined the Lombard League. At the end of the 12th century, it accepted the protection of Milan and became practically a dominion of the Visconti and later of the Sforza. In the Battle of Novara in 1513, Swiss mercenaries defending Novara for the Sforzas of Milan routed the French troops besieging the city. This defeat ended the French invasion of Italy in the War of the League of Cambrai.

In 1706, Novara, which had long ago been promised by Filippo Maria Visconti to Amadeus VIII of Savoy, was occupied by Savoyard troops. With the Peace of Utrecht, the city, together with Milan, became part of the Habsburg Empire. After its occupation in 1734, Novara passed, in the following year, to the House of Savoy.

After Napoleon's campaign in Italy, Novara became the capital of the Department of the Agogna, but was then reassigned to the House of Savoy in 1814. In 1821, it was the site of a battle in which regular Sardinian troops defeated the Piedmontese constitutional liberals. In the even larger Battle of Novara in 1849, the Sardinian army was defeated by the Austrian army of Field Marshal Joseph Radetzky von Radetz. This defeat led to the abdication of Charles Albert of Sardinia and to the partial occupation of the city by the Austrians. The defeat of the Sardinians can be seen as the beginning of the Italian unification movement.

A decree in 1859 created the province of Novara, which then included the present-day provinces of Vercelli, Biella, and Verbano-Cusio-Ossola.

The city of Novara had a population of 25,144 in 1861. Industrialisation during the 20th century brought an increase in the city's population to 102,088 in 1981. The city's population has changed little in subsequent years.

Oscar Luigi Scalfaro, former president of Italy and Italian senator for life, was born in Novara in 1918.

During World War II, the Stalag 365 German prisoner-of-war camp was relocated from Włodzimierz in German-occupied Poland to Novara in September 1943. It held Italian POWs, and was dissolved in March 1944.

The city was the set for the 1971 film "The Working Class Goes to Heaven" by Elio Petri; the film was presented at Cannes Film Festival and has won multiple awards; its soundtrack was composed by Ennio Morricone, who also appears in a cameo.

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