of idleness), describing it as a very delightful villa, where there are many houses and beautiful gardens of citizens, among which the pride of the former Prospero Cepolla, which now belongs to Gio Francesco de lords Counts Della Lengueglia.

In 1680 we have the news that this Bonifacio Bamonte, canon of the cathedral and rector of the church of Lusignano who was accused of committing acts of filth and crimes, for which he had to intervene with an absolute, Pope Clement XII.

When Napoleon stayed in Albenga in 1796, he plundered all the communities, including that of Lusignano which saw many of its treasures disappear: some sacred objects and the statue of San Bartolomeo were saved.

The small town has the good fortune to host during the 19th century the comtesse de Genlis, writer and pedagogist, gifted with a liberal education, expounded her theory pedagogical in the treatise Adéle and Theodore , a novel written in Lusignano.

It takes the aspect of the days she lives between here and nearby Albenga, she describes that the shepherdesses used to adorn their hair with flowers picked from the field and even if humble they are very elegant in their bearing.

During the World War I she made her great contribution to the victory of Italy, and during the second it was a country whose hills gave refuge to the partisans, who according to legends and findings deposited many of their armament in the abundant caves.

During the war in the main square the Nazis carried out the death sentences of some partisans and civilians: on December 6, 1944, Giovanni Gitotta and Francesco De Paoli were shot in front of the Perseghini furnace.

When the sun had not yet risen, on the morning of December 13, 1944, a search of all the houses in the town was carried out by German soldiers, who finding nothing forced the entire population to gather in the central square, including women and children.

Given the rain that had come out, the priest, Don Remoino, opened the doors of the parish church and the military allowed the women and children to take shelter.

At 19.30 on the 30th about thirty soldiers surrounded the house commanded by lieutenant Hangel, the Camillettis went to the chicken coop without fail, taking what was hidden the day before, giving proof of the guilt of the eighteen year old who was arrested; the spouses themselves wore the German uniform.

The story was told on the evening of April 24, 1945, in the home of Candido Stien and his wife Maddalena Amoi in San Fedele, where a German soldier, Felix, who was in retreat, confided in the weight that oppressed him, telling what had happened, also calling his mother by the young man, Luigia Sardo Bruno.

The structure and urban planning of the town remained unchanged, or at most with few changes, for many centuries, preserving in its inhabitants a spirit that dates back to the Middle Ages, linked to the land and moral values.

On the night of July 28, 1991, the carabiniere Germano Giovanni Bonello, free from duty, saved the occupants of a car that he had crashed before the tank exploded.

For this reason, the President of the Republic, by decree dated April 30, 1992, recognizes the silver medal for civil valor for the carabiniere, as a shining example of uncommon daring and a high sense of duty.

On 9 February 1430 the church received a new priest for the care of souls, it was the last act of the two vicars of the provisional government of the diocese, the day after he took office to Albenga the new bishop Matteo Del Carretto.

The baptistery arrived under the bishop's care of Napoleone Fieschi on 14 October 1460, with the obligation of 10 soldi to be paid to the archpriest; this permit will later be withdrawn without explanation.

Expanded in the following centuries, with a major modification in Baroque age, the ceiling is decorated with a bas-relief that should have ended with gold beads in the part near the altar, a symbol that for a war or for a famine could not finish the work.

During the campaign of Italy Napoleon Bonaparte took possession of the villa, but thanks to a personal acquaintance with the bishop Dania, who had been a schoolmate of the young general, he was able to obtain protection.

In 1820 the new bishop of Albenga – Carmelo Cordiviola – with the excuse of the unhealthy air (perhaps due to the recent construction of the Perseghini furnace, very close to the villa) which had settled in Lusignano, asked and obtained from the government to have access to a large and abandoned convent in Alassio where another seminary opened, capable of hosting all the clerics even in the autumn months.

With the unification of Italy, the Church saw many of its assets removed and even the villa of Lusignano, during the episcopal administration of Pietro Anacleto Siboni, risked a change of ownership which was averted in 1867 thanks to the help of the lawyer Giuseppe Leone Mantica.

In 1921 it was sold by Bishop Angelo Cambiaso who bought the Verzi-Loano paper mill with the proceeds; however, during the Second World War it functioned for some time as a seminary even in winter.

The archaeological site was discovered in 1995, during the works for the group of buildings of Rusineo, along the piedmont strip, which limits towards south the flat ground of Albenga, between the outlying wards of Lusignano and Barbano.

The archaeological area goes towards east-west on a hillock, raised by about ten meters as to the flat ground; here it is possible to recognize the remains of a farm or of the pars rustica of a villa.

Some tiles, cemented along the wall limiting the inner side of the yard, slightly sloping towards the external, seem actually canalizations for the discharge of sewage, while in the near small basin, whose bottom covered with mortar and pottery fragments is still kept, it is possible to see a drinking trough.

The inscription recalls the name of the customer of the work, the collector of antiquities Prospero Cepolla , born in Palermo in 1543, who wanted to give monumental forms to his father's land starting in 1550 and continued until 1594 described with the words: The result was a residential complex consisting of “a villa surrounded by a wall with a house inside and an adjoining lawn and vineyard named the Garzeo located in the place of Lusignano.

In 1832 the Senatorial Manifesto was issued by the King, according to which the dead would no longer be able to bury themselves in churches or villages for health reasons; a land is chosen for the burial outside the built-up area.