One of the minor Po Valley capitals, it boasted a small court yet well equipped by the Bentivoglio marquises, masters of water and reclamation techniques.

[tone] Starting from Piazza Cavallotti and along Via Vittorio Emanuele II, we are inserted in a long perspective channel, closed at the bottom of the civic tower.

Also facing the square is the Collegiata di S. Maria della Neve, again designed by Aleotti but remade after its destruction from a flood, which houses a Crucifixion by Camillo Ricci.

Moving forward, after crossing the threshold of the civic tower, the magnificent and bright square space of Piazza Bentivoglio (1594–1600) opens up in all its symbolic power before visitors.

[citation needed] And as such it already appeared in its day when its function was simultaneously that of public square and courtyard of honour for the palace (today occupied by a large garden).

The protagonist of this spectacular urban management was Prince Cornelio – then Ippolito – with the help of the engineer, architect and set designer Giovanni Battista Aleotti, known as "L'Argenta", active in Ferrara and Parma, where ten years later he would produce the Teatro Farnese (a Renaissance theatre in Palazzo della Pilotta).

Decorations, stuccoes and paintings recount the mythology of the Po Valley that grew up in the shadow of the history of Rome, of the Aeneid and of Chivalric poems.

Like the Gonzaga at Palazzo Te, even the Bentivoglio, on a smaller scale, wanted their Sala dei Giganti frescoed with the cycle of Jerusalem Delivered by Pier Francesco Battistelli.

In 1600, the church of Santa Maria della Neve was also completed: of the Bentivoglio building only the façade remains, designed by Aleotti, well integrated in the arcades of the square.

The church of Sant'Andrea, of ancient foundation (documented for the first time in 1233), presides over the wide open square on which the civic well was built in 1775 in the form of a temple and with an octagonal central body, designed by Giovanni Battista Fattori.

Founded near the River Po, it is preserved in its original architectural structure and in the lavish stucco decorations by Martino Ferraboschi, to whom the façade design (1667–69) is attributed.

Fishing and canoeing in the Po river, walks in the protected woods (Caldarèn) and bike rides on the cycle paths across the floodplain area.

For its poplar woods and white willows, old sand quarries, oxbow lakes and big water holes, the floodplain is a captivating place.

Behind the main riverbank, which rises nearly behind Piazza Bentivoglio, between two roads opened in the 16th century, a protected area has been created, the Caldarèn, in which flora and fauna of the plane (carp, tench, chubs and water birds) may find shady hideouts.