Ravenna was the capital of the Western Empire in the 5th century, and traces of its great past can be found in its basilicas, baptisteries and mausoleums. A dense pine wood surrounds the city, while numerous seaside resorts coast the beach. Not to be missed: Dante's Tomb and the Dante Museum, the mosaic of the Galla Placida Mausoleum, of the San Vitale Basilica, of the Orthodox Baptistery and of the S. Apollinare Nuovo Basilica. The Teodorico Mausoleum, the near S. Apollinare in Classe Basilica and the National Museum.

DANTE IN RAVENNA

Dante left Verona in 1317, and he spent the final years of his life in Ravenna. During his stay in Ravenna, the poet devoted himself to finishing Paradiso. During a trip from Venice back to Ravenna, on the night between the 13th and 14th of September, he passed away. Dante's body was laid to rest in a sarcophagus placed under the outer portico of the Franciscan monastery, to the left of the façade of the Basilica of San Francesco. The Florentines wanted to reclaim the bones but the Franciscans hid them. Only in 1885 was the urn found by chance: the bones were then placed in the tomb designed in 1780 by the architect Camillo Morigia.