Pisa Travel Guide

The city's political zenith came late in the eleventh century with a series of victories over the Saracens : the Pisans brought back from Arab cultures long-forgotten ideas of science, architecture and philosophy. Decline set in with defeat by the Genoese in 1284, followed by the silting-up of Pisa's harbour. From 1406 the city was governed by Florence, whose Medici rulers re-established the University of Pisa, one of the intellectual forcing houses of the Renaissance; Galileo was one of the teachers there. Subsequent centuries saw Pisa fade into provinciality.

The city's political zenith came late in the eleventh century with a series of victories over the Saracens : the Pisans brought back from Arab cultures long-forgotten ideas of science, architecture View the rest of this article