Riva di Solto

Riva di Solto has 862 inhabitants on the western shore of Lake Iseo, in a place with a climate of its own: facing south and warmed by the water, it rarely drops below zero in winter, so much so that olives grow here and palms and bougainvillea have taken hold. A few hundred metres from the houses the shore becomes the Bogn, a natural amphitheatre of cliffs plunging sheer into the lake, hiding small bays and gravel beaches; the road that goes on towards Lovere is cut entirely into the rock.

The making of the village, though, was stone. At the locality of Zu they quarried a very particular black marble, and that marble travelled far: among the buildings made with it is the basilica of San Marco in Venice. Later, cement quarrying was added to it. The village has kept its medieval shape, with a castle at Zorzino, five towers and the remains of the wall that closed the houses in, and on some buildings you can still see the arms of the Foresti, an eagle with a crown: in 1330 the emperor Louis the Bavarian created the county of Solto and made one Matteo Foresti a count palatine, with exemptions valid for his descendants too. The little church of San Rocco was built in 1530 on a vow made during the plague, and holds the first picture Enea Salmeggia ever painted.