San Vincenzo (San Viçenso in Ligurian) is a central district of Genoa, administratively included in the Municipio I Centro Est. Located a short distance from Brignole train station, it includes part of the very central Via XX Settembre, the main artery of Genoa's commercial area.

Description of the district

Toponym The neighborhood takes its name from the church of the same name, now deconsecrated, named after St. Vincent of Saragossa. Until the construction of the “New Walls” in the 17th century, it was a suburb outside the city's defensive walls called “Borgo di Bisagno,” because it was located a short distance from the stream of the same name.

Territory Historically, the sestiere of San Vincenzo was created after the construction of the seventeenth-century walls and included the entire area to the east between the sixteenth-century city walls and the Mura Nuove. It was thus a vast territory that in addition to the plain on the right bank of the Bisagno River also included the hilly area that today forms the Castelletto district.

With the constitution of the districts, the area of Castelletto was detached and the urban core of the San Vincenzo district merged with that of Portoria, another historic city district, creating the "Portoria" district, subdivided into the "urban units" of "San Vincenzo"Including in addition to the area of San Vincenzo proper also the heart of the old Portoria district. and "Carignano," and today included in the Municipio I Centro Est.

The San Vincenzo area proper includes the area on the right bank of the Bisagno River once bounded by the two city walls: to the west the sixteenth-century one, in the section between the Acquasola gate (present-day Piazza Corvetto) and the Cappuccine walls, which still delimits the neighborhood towards Portoria and Carignano; to the east the "New Walls," facing the Bisagno with the large embankment of the "Fronti Basse," in which the Pila and Romana gates opened, on the roads heading east. Today, with the disappearance of the “Fronti Basse,” demolished in the late 19th century, the axis of Via Fiume and Via Brigata Liguria demarcates the area of San Vincenzo from that of the Foce.

To the north, the boundary with the Castelletto neighborhood consists of a short stretch of Via Assarotti and the axis of Via Peschiera and Via F. Romani, up to the Zerbino walls, which delimit the neighborhood to the east from that of San Fruttuoso.

Demography The “urban unit” of San Vincenzo, which as mentioned also includes the former sestiere of Portoria, has a population of 5,323 (as of December 31, 2010).

Available historical data concern the former Portoria district as a whole, with the two urban units of San Vincenzo and Carignano. The demographic history of the former district is affected by the urbanistic vicissitudes of the area. The population, 35,877 at the first census in 1861, rose to 40,260 in 1901, a figure representing the “historical maximum.” Since then, with the transformation of these former working-class neighborhoods into an area designated for business centers and tertiary activities, a conspicuous population decline began. The population, still 35,007 in 1936, declined to 20,021 in 1961,Comune di Genova - Ufficio Statistica, Atlante demografico della città, luglio 2008. down to the current 12,331, of which 5,323, as already mentioned, are in the San Vincenzo urban unit alone.

History

Origins The “borgo di Bisagno” originally consisted of the houses lined up along the medieval street that exited the city heading east, first through the Porta Soprana and then, with the construction of the fourteenth-century walls, through the Porta degli Archi. This road, frequented from ancient times, as evidenced by several archaeological findings,Articolo sul Secolo XIX dell'8 ottobre 2009Il Secolo XIX, La mia gente, 1983. crossed the Bisagno River at the bridge of S. Agata, near the “borgo degli Incrociati,” which at one time, before the construction of the New Walls, was the natural continuation of the “borgo di Bisagno.”In the 11th century the area of the district was an agricultural zone of ecclesiastical property, and a chapel dedicated to St. Vincent the Martyr was built there in 1059, which was transformed into an oratory a century later. In its place in the 17th century a church was built, which was suppressed in 1813 and today houses the Officers' Club.Note storiche su www.viedigenova.com A. Torti, Vie di Portoria, 1996

This is how Giustiniani, a bishop and historian, described the area in his “Annals” in the early sixteenth century:

The Mura Nuove and the sestiere of S. Vincenzo Between 1626 and 1632, with the construction of the “Mura Nuove” (New Walls), part of the area was incorporated within the defensive walls; The “borgo di Bisagno,” renamed after the parish church, along with S. Teodoro (another city area incorporated within the circle of the walls), were counted among the city's sestieri, joining the four historic sestieri. The construction of the Mura Nuove came to break the continuity of the borough: while the area around the church of S. Vincenzo was included within the new circle of walls along with part of the Bisagno plain and became the heart of the new sestiere, Borgo Incrociati remained outside it.

The Nineteenth Century

Although incorporated within the city walls, the district until the 19th century did not undergo significant changes. The main residential settlement remained the one along the main street, while the rest of the plain had a mainly agricultural use, with a few modest dwellings extending as far as the Carignano hill. The only building of any significance in the area known as “Abrara”Toponym derived from a Lombard term for suburban land cultivated with grassland () (today's Cesarea Street and neighboring streets) was the ancient church of “S. Martino de via,” later S. Maria della Pace, which would later be demolished to make room for the urban expansion at the end of the century.

The urban plan prepared by architect Carlo Barabino in 1825, aimed at extending the city towards the east by overcoming the limits of the medieval city found, albeit amid various difficulties, a first partial application only between the 1930s and 1940s, under the direction of G.B. Resasco, who after Barabino's death in 1835 had succeeded him in the role of civic architect. In the mid-1940s, Via Colombo, parallel to the old S. Vincenzo street, and Via Galata, perpendicular to it, were built; at the intersection of the new streets, Piazza Colombo was constructed. The square, square in shape, was built following Barabino's design in principle, with four identical porticoed buildings constructed by entrepreneur Pietro Gambaro. With the new houses, the old village of artisans and peasants was gradually transformed into an elegant residential neighborhood.

In 1834 work was begun on the construction, in the area of today's Via Cesarea, of the asylum, the first city facility specifically intended for the hospitalization of the mentally ill, next to which a number of beehive-shaped houses for the working classes were built by entrepreneur Francesco Ponte.

The asylum, designed by Barabino, was completed under the direction of Celestino Foppiani in 1841. The structure consisted of a central circular building on five floors that housed the administration offices and common services. From this branched six building wings destined for the cells of the hospitalized patients. Gardens were created in the spaces between the various wings, and the whole complex was bounded outward by a circular portico.Veduta del manicomio dalle mura di S. Chiara The structure, which occupied a total area of about two hectares, was inaugurated on August 14, 1841.F. Alizeri, "Guida artistica per la città di Genova", 1846. However, the large building was short-lived: towards the end of the century, with the opening of Via XX Settembre, the area was given a residential use; thus, the new psychiatric hospital in Quarto was built, to which the patients were transferred in 1894. The building was demolished in 1914.

A real turning point in the urban development of the neighborhood occurred towards the end of the 19th century, with the construction of Via XX Settembre. With the opening of this artery, the city center was shifted sharply to the east.

The street, built by rectifying and widening the existing Via Giulia (in the Portoria district), Via della Consolazione and Via Porta Pila, was characterized from the beginning by Art Nouveau architecture; among the architects who participated in the various designs was the Florentine Gino Coppedè.

The twentieth century

Between the end of the nineteenth century and the first two decades of the twentieth century, the urbanization of the Abrara area was completed, which was totally changed after the construction of Via XX Settembre, with the demolition of the asylum, the long-deconsecrated Church of Peace, and the few modest dwellings that stood in an area still partly cultivated with vegetable gardens. In place of these buildings and the remaining agricultural areas, a new elegant residential and commercial district was thus created in the quadrangle between Via XX Settembre, Via del Prato (today Via Brigata Liguria) and the Walls of St. Clare.

The urban layout thus outlined at the turn of the century has not undergone significant changes since the 1920s. Buildings constructed during the twentieth century include the “Museum of Natural History” (1912), the “Theater of Youth” (1930), the “Palace of Financial Offices,” built in the 1930s on the site of the nineteenth-century slaughterhouse, and the Telecom skyscraper on the corner of Via S. Vincenzo and Via Fiume, built in the 1960s to a design by Piero Gambacciani.

Monuments and places of interest

Streets and squares Historically, the suburb of San Vincenzo was located on the direct route from Genoa to the east, which, exiting the city through the gates opened in the successive extensions of the city walls, crossed the Bisagno River at the Sant'Agata Bridge. Over time, a new access from the east at Borgo Pila, which had sprung up across the stream on the Bisagno plain, had increased in importance.

The road axes delineated by these routes currently correspond to Via S. Vincenzo and Via XX Settembre, at the end of which, in the seventeenth-century walls, Porta Romana and Porta Pila opened, respectively. In the area between these two streets, the first urban expansion of the neighborhood (Via Colombo, Piazza Colombo and Via Galata) developed around 1840.

Via XX Settembre