Building Stones of Milan and Lombardy, Volume 2 Stones of Lombardy

About this book

Milan and Lombardy have played an important role in the Italian country since the Roman period. This importance is reflected also by the diffusion of stone architecture: a persisting trait of Milan architecture was the use of different stones in the same building. Milan lies in the middle of the alluvial plain of the Po, far from the stone quarries; some waterways were dug out in order to supply the building stones from the surrounding territories.

The study of stone as a building material was significant at the end of the 19th century, but then it was largely neglected by both architects and geologists. So it is significant to suggest a study about the stones employed to build in Milan (Volume 1) in relationship with a petrographic study about the features of the stones quarried in the whole Lombard territory (Volume 2).

Volume 2 contains a description of the features of the stones reported in Volume 1. These features include metamorphic and magmatic rocks of the Alpine area; sedimentary rocks and loose materials of the Prealpine area; sedimentary rocks of the Apennine area; and loose sediments of the Padania plain. Some stones, coming from other northern Italian regions, and used in Lombard architecture, are also described. Each stone is described in a "card" containing commercial and historical names, petrographic classification, macroscopic features, mineralogical composition, microscopic features, geological setting, quarry sites, transport to yards, the morphology of dressed elements and surface handworking, use in architecture in the whole Lombard territory and abroad and decay morphologies. A particular investigation is addressed to the stones used during the 20th century; a great part of them was never used before in Milan and in Lombardy.

Contents

1. Geology of Lombardy
2. Stone quarrying, transporting and dressing in Milan and Lombardy
3. Decay phenomena on building stones of Lombardy
4. Stones from the province of Bergamo
5. Stones from province of Brescia
6. Stones of the province of Como and Lecco
7. Stone from province of Pavia
8. Stones from province of Sondrio
9. Stones from the province of Varese
10. Stones from Verbano-Cusio-Ossola
11. Stones from Apulia
12. Stones from Piedmont
13. Stones of Friuli Venezia-Giulia
14. Stones from Latium
15. Stones from Liguria
16. Stones of Trentino-Alto Adige
17. Stones from the region Toscana
18. Stones from Veneto
19. Stones from Europe
20. Coloured marbles (opus sectile, inlay)
21. Mortar and plaster
22. Brick and Artificial stone
23. Masonry
24. Pavements
25. Church Altars
26. Monuments
27. Funeral Chapels of Cimitero Monumentale
28. Atlas of stones and their textures

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Biography

Roberto Bugini was born in Milan, Italy, in 1952. He graduated in Scienze Geologiche (geology), University of Milan, in 1976. Since 1983 he has been a researcher of CNR-ICVBC Istituto Conservazione Beni Culturali. He has been a lecturer in stone materials at the Scuola di Specializzazione in Archeologia - Universita Cattolica di Milano, since 2009. His fields of interest are stones and mortars used in historic architecture with particular application to the territory of Lombardy (Italy).

Luisa Folli was born in Lodi in 1956. She graduated in Scienze Naturali (natural sciences), University of Milan, in 1990. Since 1991 Luisa has worked in the field of stone conservation and has been a teacher (Mineralogy and Petrography) at Scuola di Restauro ENAIP - Percorso quinquennale per Restauratori Beni Culturali (Botticino-Brescia) since 1995. Field of interest: scientific analyses on nature and decay of historic building materials. References: about 150 articles on books, journals and proceedings.