The Bolognese Square

Bologna has never been able to stay silent: before its squares became architectural masterpieces, they were created as “sounding boards” for its inhabitants, who considered civic commitment a collective duty. Now, walking in the city center isn’t a solitary affair, but instead a constant dialog with the ghosts of people who shouted for freedom or built the common good. In recent months, there’s been a powerful revival of the concept of the square as a “living body”: the stones of Bologna have once again become the physical support of a dissent that rejects the virtual mandate of social media, the site of constant mobilization that combines solidarity for international conflicts and anger for domestic emergencies such as the high cost of living and erosion of the right to housing.

Everything gravitates around Piazza Maggiore (Main Square). Its “Crescentone,” the central platform in pink and white granite installed in 1934 to level the square’s surface, is more than an architectural element: it’s the city’s emotional center of gravity, a place that learned to treat wounds by transforming private suffering into public demands. It was here, outside Palazzo d’Accursio, that a fascist attack during the installation of Ennio Gnudi’s socialist council on 21 November 1920 killed ten citizens and councilor Giulio Giordani, marking the beginning of agrarian squadrism in Italy. But the square was also the site of rebirth: after the Liberation on 21 April 1945, it became the space of collective recognition, where partisans came down from the hills to meet an exhausted but finally free populace. This moral thermometer has never cooled. In recent months, we’ve seen the Crescentone disappear under thousands of bodies united in vigils for solidarity and for demonstrations against the wars in the Middle East and in Ukraine. Today, reclaiming this space means restoring the function of the ancient agora. There is no real social space in Bologna without crossing Piazza Verdi, the throbbing laboratory of the university zone. Its very creation is linked to rebellion: it rises on what was once the Bentivoglio Palace, destroyed by popular revolt in 1507. The ruins (remaining for centuries) were called “i guasti” (“rubble”), a physical warning against tyranny, now the site of the Teatro Comunale. The student Francesco Larusso was killed on this square on 11 March 1977, setting off a riot that caused via Zamboni to be guarded by armored vehicles. More recently, the square was the center of social and university criticism, hosting spontaneous demonstrations against high rents and protests in favor of environmental protection, confirming that Bologna is still able to transform conflict into collective participation. From medieval battles for freedom to tents pitched by students against the high cost of living, the Bolognese square remains the last stronghold against isolation, teaching us that freedom is not a state of mind, but a shared space to be claimed and experienced every day. Bologna refuses to remain silent, reminding us that as long as there is an open square, there will be a possibility of building a future together.

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