A priest of Rovereto, don Antonio Rossaro, had the idea of remembering the dead of the first world war by casting a bell from the bronze of the cannon of every country that had fought. He wrote to the diplomatic services of the former enemy states asking for decommissioned artillery, and many sent it: the bell is called Maria Dolens and stands on the hill of Miravalle.
What to see
It was cast a first time and inaugurated in 1925, when it was the largest bell in Italy: eleven tonnes, a little over two and a half metres across. But the sound was not the one wanted, and in 1938 it was recast; then, having cracked again, it was recast once more. In all it has been poured four times.
The last bell was blessed in St Peter's Square in 1965 and brought up here, to a new site on the hill above the city, where it hangs in the open under a frame. Every evening it sounds its strokes in memory of the fallen of all wars, and around it runs a path with the flags of the member countries.
Visiting
The hill of Miravalle is a few minutes by car from the centre of Rovereto, with a car park and a climb on foot; ticket and seasonal hours, and it is worth asking at what time the bell rings. An hour.
Our editors' tip
Come up in the late afternoon, stay for the strokes and then look around you: the valley in front of you was the front line, and the mountains you see from here bear the names you read on memorial tablets across half of Italy. The sound and the landscape say the same thing, but the landscape says it more quietly.
