Towers and palaces of the Roero

By the end of the 13th century, the Municipality of Asti, through the financing of the mercantile families was able to weave a fruitful network of alliances and trade agreements.

The league that the municipality formed with Pavia, Genoa and the Marquisate of Saluzzo led to the defeat of the Angevin army[2] and enabled it to dominate over most of south-central Piedmont.

The seventeenth-century Laurus map shows how many strongholds and towers there still were in the city's built-up area and only leaves one to speculate what the actual urban layout was during the period of maximum fourteenth-century expansion.

At the end of his stay, Arrigo of Dantesque fame[4] as a sign of gratitude bestowed certain privileges that allowed the Contrada to be considered a free and inviolable territory with respect to the other city districts, assuming a connotation of extraterritoriality.

There were probably more towers in the medieval period, although many of those that were started were never completed due to the economic inability of the casane to afford the high construction costs.

nor can the deceased be transported through itIn the communal period, the shift from the commercial activity of goods to that of money led in Asti to a centralization of wealth around a limited group of families (the casane) that ended up characterizing and changing the urban fabric of the city as well.

The gate, by jurisdiction was divided into a number of contrade or vicinie with mainly aristocratic connotations:[10] The contrada Roera began to form in the 13th century.

These buildings, independent of each other, were provided with a curtain wall when in the 13th century, with the intensification of struggles between the Guelph and Ghibelline parties,[12] there arose the need to fortify and protect properties.

During this period, Emperor Henry VII of Luxembourg was hosted for more than a month in the house of Tommaso di Aicardo Roero,[13] a powerful Ghibelline leader.

[15] In 1299, a branch of the Roero family was invested by the bishop of Asti, Blessed Guido da Valperga,[16] with the places of Monteu, Santo Stefano Belbo and Castagnito.

Pictorial decorations embellish the tower, depicting the Roero coat of arms,[20] and the top features three bands of small arches ending in merlons.

[27] On November 10, 1310, Henry VII of Luxembourg arrived in Asti to subdue the city, which had been at the mercy of continuous civil wars for nearly fifty years.

During his stay, which lasted almost a month, he brought back the Ghibelline faction of De Castello, confirmed all privileges to the city, and renewed the Major Council: the Podestà and the Capitano del popolo were replaced by an imperial vicar.

As a sign of submission, the people of Asti aggregated 100 militia and more than 1,000 infantrymen[28] to support the emperor engaged in some battles in Lombardy, but after a few years too many taxes and harassment by the imperial vicars (Amadeus V of Savoy and Philip of Acaja) made the city resentful of the sovereign.

With the help of the Angevin seneschal Ugo del Balzo, they drove the Ghibelline faction of De Castello out of the city and on April 17, 1312, signed an act of dedication to King Robert of Anjou their lifelong enemy.

[29] The second passageway, orthogonal and leaning against the north side of the previous one, is of lesser importance and extent: it was probably built by the Roero family as part of the overall modernization and expansion of the building.

"[31] The coats of arms of the Roero family with the motto: "DE TOUT À SON PLAISIR" (everything to his liking) stand out all over the ceiling.

[32] Given the richness of the decorations, the knight with the fleur-de-lis, and the presence of a French motto other than that of the family, Bera surmises that this mansion may have been the lodging of Henry VII of Luxembourg who came to Asti in 1310 and stayed for nearly a month.

Work on the decorations and furnishings was completed in the late 18th century with funding from the Roero family, who held patronage over the high altar,[35] becoming their aristocratic church.

The stone, probably of French-Piedmontese workmanship, depicts a Gothic escutcheon with the Roero coat of arms, surmounted by a helmet with mantling and crest consisting of a rising donkey.

[39] The large trading depot suggests that the building was probably a commercial construction of the family, used mainly as a warehouse and storage of goods in a strategic area of the city, a few hundred meters from the gate of San Martino and thus at a point of high density of passage.

On the corner of Piazza San Giuseppe and Via Grassi there is a medieval palace that Gabiani assumed was joined to the gateway through the bastions of the wall circle "of the nobles.

[42] The angle positioned about 4 meters above the ground depicts in the center a flower grafting on a branch from which a pine cone emerges in relief.

The side facing Via Grassi is engraved with a stylized wheel, possibly made at a later date when the house became the property of the Roero family.

In 1369, there was still a debt of 10000 florins owed by Count Verde Amadeus VI of Savoy to Domenico and Guglielmo Roero,[44] in the face of a still active banking business.

[45] With the exemption of some taxes and the creation in 1397 of the Molleggio society - a sort of ante-litteram joint-stock company devoted to the exploitation of the mills present along the course of the Borbore and the Triversa stream - he made the Asti nobles, who maintained a high economic standard during that period, participate.

[49] Many "domus" went into decline either because of the exhaustion of the seigneurial line or because the city's leading figures bought large palaces in the Savoy capital and moved there, to make a life of court as diplomats, officials or ecclesiastical dignitaries.

Others are still being restored or consolidated, such as the Roero Palace in Settime and Mombarone, as part of a larger project of urban redevelopment of the city's historic center.

Via Roero seen from the south, in the background the Roero tower of Monteu
--- Nobles' enclosure and St. Martin's gate
Piazza San Giuseppe
Piazza San Martino
Location of the towers
1 Church of San Giuseppe 2 Church of San Martino 3 Confraternity of San Michele a Palace of the Pelletta family of Cortazzone b Ruins of houses of the Roero family c Palace of the "equestrian games" d Palace of Calosso and of Cortanze e Tomatis Palace of Chiusavecchia f Palace and tower of Cortanze g The complex of Monteu h Palace of Settime and Mombarone i Palace and tower Musso-Isnardi
Piazza San Martino in the 17th century. The complex of buildings of the Roero family of Monteu had their entrance inside the square, on an alley that separated them from the church of San Martino with the facade still facing west toward the palaces to create a small square.
The western block facing St. Martin's Square. At the southern apex the palace of Settime and Mombarone. To the north are the De Regibus houses with their distinctive octagonal tower. At the lower right the palace and tower of the Monteu family. Identified to the right, in San Martino square, is the church of the Archconfraternity of San Micele and opposite the De Regibus tower, the church of Sant'Anastasio in Corso Alfieri
The Musso-Isnardi palace in the Theatrum map. Notice at the corner the imposing three-story tower and the small turret to the side, inside some courtyards with gardens bordered by service buildings
The emperor's residence, the block with the houses of the Roero of Calosso and of Cortanze. At the eastern vertex the tower of the Cortanze family (now lowered) is still visible, while in the southern part of the block the buildings once belonging to Thomas of Aicardo and probable imperial lodgings of Henry VII of Luxembourg can be seen
The western side of the medieval " consortium " of the Roero as it appeared in the 17th century. Together with the eastern block including the houses of the Cortanze, it formed the southern axis of the Contrada Rotaria. One can identify, at the northern vertex, the Palaces of the Roero of Poirino , of the Roero of Calosso , in the center the Convent of the "Teresian" Carmelites (which would later become the Roero and Tomatis Palace of Chiusavecchia), with the related "cultivations," and to the south the ancient church with the façade still facing east
The gate of San Martino was an important commercial outlet for goods arriving from Alba and Borbore . Behind it, on the western side, the palace of the Roero family can be seen; to the right is the palace that later belonged to the Pelletta family of Cortazzone