Via Cappello & Porta Leoni
Street
Remains of the Porta Leoni
Via Cappello and Porta Leoni
Commercial street in ancient Verona
When on the Via Cappello, most tourists only make it as far as the Casa di Giulietta (Juliet’s house), but the Via Cappello with its many shops and restaurants is a popular shopping street for the locals. The Via Cappello was once the main road when you were coming from Bologna and entered the city through the Porta Leoni. The Via Cappello divides at the remains of the old city gate and you can visit the excavations of the Porta Leoni in the middle.
The former name of the Porta Leoni was Porta San Fermo or Arco di Valerio. Its current name owes its origins to the discovery of two statues of a lion that were found during the excavations around the gate.
Ancient Verona
The Porta leoni was built in the 1st century B.C. together with the first city walls, which were subsequently upgraded on several occasions. The Via Cappello formed the cardo maximus of the Roman city and, together with the Corso Porta Borsari and the Corso Sant’Anastasia, divided the city into 4 equal squares. Parts of the defensive wall around the Porta Leoni still remain and are visible in the buildings around – they are considered to be the most important surviving monuments of the ancient city of Verona.
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