Santarcangelo di Romagna. The art of good living.

Crossed by the Via Consolare Emilia, Santarcangelo di Romagna is the city that most of all is characterized by the vivacity of cultural and artistic interests, that attract and pleasantly surprise.
It is a cultural vivacity that derives from having given birth to many important personalities and artists: the painter Guido Cagnacci in the 17th century, Pope Clemente XIV (Giovanni Vincenzo Antonio Ganganelli) in the 18th century, the academic and essayist Count Antonio Baldini in the 19th century and, also, the epigraphist Augusto Campana, the historian Gioacchino Volpe, the theater actress Teresa Franchini, the screenwriter, poet and painter Tonino Guerra, the poet Raffaello Baldini, the painter Giulio Turci, the composer Giulio Faini, the academic Caval Renato Pedretti, the ceramist and painter Lucio Bernardi, and many others, between the end of the 1800s and the 1900s.

The first settlements of Santarcangelo are from the Roman period, and date back to 268 BC. In the Middle Ages, the houses built around the Colle Iovis, formed the typical fortified village that still characterizes the upper historic centre. After the dominion of the Malatesta, the lords of Rimini enlarged the lower part of city at the foot of the hill. Here, around the current Piazza Ganganelli and the Arch dedicated to Pope Clement XIV, the lower eighteenth and nineteenth-century historical centre was born.
The strategic location of Santarcangelo on the Via Emilia and the proximity to the sea of Rimini have always favoured its propensity of being an active centre of commerce (its famous Fairs) and a coveted tourist destination.
Today, its elegant downtown streets full of creative shops and the many places for food and wine connoisseurs, bring a significant number of visitors, also attracted by the numerous cultural initiatives including the annual Theatre Festival that takes place in the square. Since 1984 Santarcangelo di Romagna has been deservedly awarded the title of Art City.

What to see in Santarcangelo (in addition to the Medieval village and the Castle):

Public monumental caves – Via Costantino Ruggeri, 9
Teodorani Caves (private) – Via Pio Massani, 8
Sisters of St. Catherine’s Caves (private) – Contrada dei Signori, 2
Parish Church of San Michele Arcangelo, a religious building from the 6th century with a 13th century bell tower – Via la Pieve, 82
Celletta Zampeschi – Mutual Aid Worker Society – Via della Cella, 9
Stamperia Marchi, one of the oldest artisan workshops in Emilia Romagna that preserves a 1633 Mangano still in operation for ironing and compacting the canvases of the typical Romagna tablecloths – Via Cesare Battisti, 15
Casa Studio Giulio Turci, Casa della Memoria – Via Don Minzoni, 49
MUSAS Historical Archaeological Museum, located inside Palazzo Cenci – Piazzetta Monache, 1
Voci dal Mondo Museum – Piazzetta Monache, 5
Monte di Pietà – In the world of Tonino Guerra – Via della Costa, 15
Button Museum, which now boasts a collection of 10,500 types of buttons – Via della Costa, 11
Ethnographic Museum of uses and customs of the people of Romagna, where the history of the rural tradition is told – Via Montevecchi, 41