Tour guide, Paola, covered some of the same ground that Amy did the previous day, but then took us into the old Bologna University building where we learned that this was the oldest university in Europe and how important it is to the town's economy. Today there are a total of about 100,000 students in Bologna, making up about 20 % of the city population. They come from all over the world. The old, original building (long outgrown) was originally constructed, after the University was already in existence for some time, to consolidate the physical location of the students and gain better control over them. In those days the students were not youngsters. They were wealthy adults who brought with them deeply seated cultures that helped make Bologna a relatively liberal and cosmopolitan society.
One of the most fascinating parts of the old building was the anatomy theater, where dissections were performed to teach students about anatomy. Initially these were only performed on animals, as the powerful Catholic Church forbade the dissection of human cadavers. However, some professors disobeyed and secretly performed dissections of human remains, ghoulishly exhumed at night from the graves of the family-less deceased.
Next we visited the Cathedral of San Petronio, patron saint of Bologna. Originally designed to be even larger than Saint Peter's in Rome, Vatican resistance caused construction to be truncated and the exterior facade has been left unfinished. A unique and most interesting feature of the church is solar calendar built into the floor. A brass band runs along the floor marking the months and days of the year. High up in the dome is a small, round window which admits sunlight. A bright spot of sunlight traces the sun's apparent movement across the floor. Just when the sun is at its apex, that spot falls onto the brass calendar indicating the day and month of the year.
This terminated the walking tour and everyone was on their own to shop and have lunch.
After lunch I took a small group to have a guided tour of the Ducati factory and museum. The museum director, Livio Lodi conducted the tour and while the production line was shut down for the holiday honoring San Petronio, it was still interesting to see and hear how these World Champion super bikes are constructed.
That night we walked from the hotel to dinner at "Pizza's" next to Nu Lounge, a favorite hangout for the younger crowd just across the main square.
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