San Martino in Soverzano Castle (Italy)

The historic manor house with a rectangular plan, situated in the locality Soverzano, was built by the Bolognese Knight Bartolomeo Manzolis in 1411 by incorporating an ancient tower of Ariosti of which now remains only the base. The castle, which has all the typical of the medieval defensive elements (towers, moat, drawbridge), however, not born with the protective requirements that characterized it in reality only for a short period (1514-1532), when the Manzolis it was granted the jurisdiction of San Martino by Leo X with the title of Counts. In the same period, the castle was restored and decorated, but the most obvious intervention is the nineteenth century through the work of Alfonso Rubbiani Tito Azzolini and that, while it has profoundly modified the internal aspect, on the other hand has maintained the system unchanged external. The curtains and the crenellated towers that distinguish it gives a distinctly fairytale aspect to the castle, located in a park. The long porch leading into the castle park was purpose built in 1684 to host an annual cattle fair that was held here traditionally since 1584, and which still continues to attract visitors every first weekend in October