Called the Castle of Milan or the Sforza Castle, it is home to the city's major historical museums. So we went to have a look. It was so interesting we went three times.
Like many castles, it began life as a fortification of the city walls six hundred years ago.
Over the centuries it was damaged, demolished and rebult and turned from fortification into grand residence of the Duke of Milan who hosted his sumptuous court here in the late 1400's.
Power changed hands and Milan was occupied by the Spanish, the Austrians, the French and the Austrians again over the course of 350 years.
It was only at the end of the 19th century, in a united Italy that it was restored and returned to the Milanese community.The two views above are of the main parade ground, behind the first ring wall and defences.
This is the secure and highly fortified inner courtyard of the ducal palace.
It is a very big castle and impossible to get it all into one photograph -so here is a representation. The commentary on the sightseeing bus mentioned something about the Kremlin in Moscow being based on this same design.
It is inside the vast expanses of the ducal palace that the fourteen museums have been created. The ceiling decorations are particularly evocative.
A new gallery being developed, I think for books and literary items.
Beautiful big spaces with wooden ceilings in sections and luminescent floors.
Plus the occasional piece of good, modern design.
In the furniture museum they had these two fabulous painted chests. This one is apparently extremely valuable and is called "The Three Dukes", but the light and lighting was so poor I could only photograph one end of it.
The colours in this chest were also quite spectacular. Both chests were in incredibly good condition.
And here is the guy who gave his name to the castle, Francesco I Sforza, a great soldier apparently and Duke of Milan from 1450. Love the hairdo.
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