Bistagno

The usual explanation points to the meeting of the two branches of the Bormida, the Spigno and the Millesimo: stagno would be not a pool of still water but the root behind Latin amnis, a watercourse. A more recent reading, built on linguistic evidence, traces the name instead to a Celtic form meaning small pheasant, a bird thought to have lived here in prehistoric times.

The old centre is an almost perfect equilateral triangle, once ringed by walls; the castle stood at its southern point, and a square tower survives from it, swallowed by a modern building. The gipsoteca in the centre keeps the original plaster models of Giulio Monteverde, a sculptor born here.