Paderno Castle

A view of Paderno Castle overlooking the main square

The elegant and striking façade of Paderno Castle overlooks the town’s main square, occupying one side of it with its continuous, graceful outline, framed by two circular towers and interrupted in the centre by a Gothic-style entrance.

The layout of the castrum and the destruction it suffered between the 14th and 16th centuries

As in Coccaglio, the historic centre of Paderno still bears the mark of the ancient castrum, visible in the buildings between the main square, Via Mazzini and Via Toselli. It was founded shortly after the year 1000 as a refuge castle, providing shelter for the population threatened by the Hungarian invasion. Much of the ancient castle was lost due to the destruction in 1326 at the hands of Azzone Visconti’s troops, and subsequently due to the events surrounding the terrible sacking of Brescia on 19 February 1512, the day on which Gaston de Foix’s army laid waste to the city, before spreading throughout the region: Paderno too suffered an assault by French troops and its fortifications were completely destroyed.

19th-century restorations and traces of the original layout

The entire complex was restored in the 19th century, and only a few sections of the castle have retained their original appearance: part of the northern walls remains, where the entrance with its large pointed arch is still visible, as are the two towers. The entrance itself acts as a dividing line between the left-hand section, where the original stone and brickwork is still visible, featuring pointed-arch windows, and the right-hand section, where the windows already have a fully Renaissance-style square profile and the walls are covered in plaster. The base of the towers remains clearly visible, with walls composed of roughly hewn stones.