Gorla Minore

Gorla Minore stands on the Olona, a little upstream of Busto Arsizio, with a history of borders that widen and close again. Under Napoleon it annexed the whole district around it — Gorla Maggiore, Marnate, Nizzolina, Prospiano, Rescalda and, briefly, Solbiate Olona — but the Austrians undid it all on their return. In 1870 Gorla Maggiore and Prospiano were attached to it once more; Gorla Maggiore later became a comune again, while Prospiano is still a frazione.

The village belonged to the Terzaghi, and to them it owes what sets it apart: in 1599 one of the family, left without heirs, willed his property to the Oblates on condition that a school be opened for local boys. That school has never closed and is reckoned the oldest state-recognised private school in Italy; it carries the name of Rotondi, the rector who kept it alive through a hard passage. The Terzaghi also left the villa that passed to the Durini, rebuilt from 1776 by cardinal Angelo Maria Durini between baroque and neoclassical and given to the town in the twentieth century.