Torre del Mangia

Tower Siena, Italy

The Torre del Mangia is located in Piazza del Campo in Siena; it is the civic tower of the town hall. It is among the tallest ancient Italian towers (the fourth, after the 112-metre-high Torrazzo of Cremona, the 97.2-metre-high Torre degli Asinelli of Bologna and the 94-metre-high Arnolfo Tower of Florence), reaching 88 meters per height of the last merlons. According to what Ranuccio Bianchi Bandinelli wrote, the Torre del Mangia, although starting from a lower elevation of the ground, reaches the same height as the bell tower of the Cathedral of Siena, this to symbolize the achieved balance between heavenly and earthly power, without neither of the two surpasses and imposes itself on the other.