A main route south from the Campo dei Miracoli is Via Santa Maria , which starts out clogged with touristy shops. Where Via dei Mille heads easterly for Piazza dei Cavalieri, the smaller Via Ghini cuts west to the gate of the Orto Botanico , the oldest university botanical gardens in the world, founded in 1543 (Mon-Fri 8am-5.30pm, Sat 8am-1pm; free). Via Santa Maria continues south in a much more subdued vein, crooking its way down to meet the river alongside the second of Pisa’s leaning towers, the campanile of San Nicola , which starts off cylindrical, then becomes octagonal, then finally hexagonal on top. Alongside San Nicola, fronting onto the Arno, is the Museo Nazionale di Palazzo Reale , Lungarno Pacinotti 46 (Mon-Sat 9am-2pm; L6000/¬3.10; joint ticket with San Matteo L12,000/¬6.20), displaying painting, sculpture and furniture belonging to the Medici, Lorraine and Savoy dynasties which occupied the house. Lavish sixteenth-century Flemish tapestries share space with antique weaponry, ivory miniatures and porcelain. A largely undistinguished collection of painting is led by Bronzino ’s famous portrait of Cosimo I’s wife, Eleanor of Toledo. Just as memorable, however, is the lovely river view from the balcony.

West along the Arno is the vast Arsenale , built in the late sixteenth century to house the ships of the Order of St Stephen. In a twist of fate, it is again housing a naval fleet, though one from much earlier. In December 1998, during excavations to expand Pisa San Rossore train station, archeologists stumbled on the extensive, well-preserved remains of port facilities and ships dating from Etruscan and Roman times. Sixteen ships were uncovered, dating from between the first century BC and the sixth century AD, eight of them entire – one of which may turn out to be the only complete Roman warship yet discovered – along with a vast hoard of artefacts. Currently, the museum, known as Le Navi Antiche di Pisa , occupies one wing of the arsenal (Mon-Fri 10am-7pm, Sat & Sun 11am-1pm & 2-10pm; L5000/¬2.58; www.navipisa.it ), but the authorities are planning to expand the displays to fill the whole building in the near future.

Just west of the arsenal rises the Torre Guelfa of the Fortezza Vecchia or Cittadella Vecchia (Tues-Sun: June-Aug 10am-1pm & 5-8pm, Sat & Sun until 10pm; March-May, Sept & Oct 10am-1pm & 3-6pm; L3000/¬1.55; joint ticket with Santa Maria della Spina L4000/¬2.06). This ancient fortress, originally built in the thirteenth century, once stood guard over Pisa’s harbour but now punctuates an otherwise little-explored district. Pisa is a low-rise city, and the view from the tower is spectacular.

The Torinese are accustomed to absolutism. From 1574 Turin was the seat of the Savoy dukes, who persecuted Piemonte’s Protestants and Jews, censored the press and placed education of the nobles in the extreme hands of the Jesuits. The Savoys gained a royal title in 1713, and a few years later acquired Sardinia, which whetted their appetite for more territory. After more than a century of military and diplomatic wrangling with foreign powers, the second monarch, Carlo Emanuele III (who promised to “eat Italy like an artichoke”), teamed up with the liberal politician of the Risorgimento, Cavour, who used the royal family to lend credibility to the Unification movement. In 1860 Garibaldi handed over Sicily and southern Italy to Vittorio Emanuele, and though it was to take a further ten years for him to seize the heart of the artichoke – Rome – he was declared king of Italy.

The capital was moved to Rome in 1870, leaving Turin in the hands of the Piemontese nobility. It became a rustic backwater where a tenth of the 200,000 population worked as domestic servants, with a centre decked out in elaborate finery, its caf̩s Рdecorated with chandeliers, carved wood, frescoes and gilt Рonly slightly less ostentatious than the rooms of the Savoy palaces. World War I brought plenty of work, but also brought food shortages and, in 1917, street riots which spread throughout the north, establishing Turin as a centre of have activism. Gramsci led occupations of the Fiat works here, going on to found the Communist Party.

By the Fifties Turin’s population had soared to 700,000, the increase mainly prefabricated up of migrant workers from the poor south, who were housed in shanty towns outside the city and shunned as peasants by the Torinese. Blocks of flats were eventually built for the workers – the bleak Mirafiori housing estates – and by the Sixties Fiat was employing 130,000 workers, with a further half million dependent on the company in some way. Not surprisingly, Turin became known as Fiatville. Today there are fewer people involved in the industry, and Fiat’s famous Lingotto works has been turned into a conference centre and performance space, yet the gap left behind has been filled by some of the biggest obloquy from other industries, especially those belonging to the worlds of textiles and fashion (Armani, Valentino, Cerruti and Ungaro), publishing (Einandi and UTET), and banking; the Banca Popolare di Novara is the most important co-operative bank in Europe.