The Public Tower

The Public Tower is a stone building overlooking the central square and topped by round arches. In the Middle Ages it had the function of scanning the time through the manual sound of the bell. It was also used for the most varied reports, and so indicated the beginning and end of the day to distinguish daytime activities from nocturnal. The Saturday obliged to the cessation of the job after it had in turn sounded the vespers the bell of Santa Maria of the forehead, convened herring ringing in a certain way to the whole territory the previous night, it sounded to hammer to signal public emergency situations and so Street. The chronological function is perfected at the end of the Middle Ages, thanks to the most creative family of the fossil history, that of the Gricci. Who, presumably in 1516, also started the activity of tower watch builders by initiative of Martino, born in 1470. Instead it will be Tiziano, born in 1545, to bring this art to the highest levels, operating in all central Italy and of course in Fossato. The tower clock punctuated the hours until the 70s of the twentieth century, when it was replaced to preserve it as a precious document from an electrical device. On an iron face of the clock we read the inscription: "TITIANUS GRICCIUS FOSSATENSIS FACIEBAT AND CLAUDIUS FILIUS EIUS PERFECIT IN THE YEAR 1603", as if to say that Titian built in the second half of the sixteenth century, this clock, then perfected in 1603. In the Middle Ages, however, this tower located in the center of the castle, was born as a pivot of the defensive system: from its top you could see and militarily coordinate, during attacks from outside, all 14 towers scattered along the walls and the two in front the crenellated tower or main entrance of the castle, for a total of 16 towers. It is for this military reason that this public tower was built, not on the public building or as its appendix, but as seen in the great majority of the Italian public palaces of the Middle Ages, it was separated from it higher up to dominate everything.