Tour de Nonza

Tour de Nonza
Coordinates 42°47′06″N 9°20′37″E / 42.78500°N 9.34361°E / 42.78500; 9.34361Coordinates: 42°47′06″N 9°20′37″E / 42.78500°N 9.34361°E / 42.78500; 9.34361
Built before 1617
Designated 5 July 1926
Reference no. PA00099219
Location of Tour de Nonza in Corsica

The Tour de Nonza (Corsican: Torra di Nonza) is a Genoese tower located in the commune of Nonza (Haute-Corse) on the coast of the French island of Corsica. The tower sits at an elevation of 155 m in the village of Nonza on the west coast of Cap Corse.

The tower was one of a series of coastal defences built by the Republic of Genoa between 1530 and 1620 to stem the attacks by Barbary pirates.[1] The exact date of construction is not known but it is included in a list compiled by the Genoese authorities in 1617 it which it was recorded that the tower was only guarded at night.[2]

The tower of Nonza is famous for its siege in 1768, during the war between Pasquale Paoli's independent Corsica and France. The troops protecting the village of Nonza had been taken prisoners by the French forces north of the village, but the commander of the troops had remained in the tower. It is said that he managed to make the French troops believe in a fierce resistance during the siege, so that the latter would agree in his conditions for surrender, that were to let him join the rest of Paoli's troops, and to grant him the military honours. When he came out alone of the tower, the French commander, stunned, asked where the troops were. He is said to have answered : "here is the commander and the troop".[3]

In 1926 the tower was listed as one of the official historical monuments of France.[4]

Notes and references

  1. ↑ Graziani, Antoine-Marie (2000). "Les ouvrages de défense en Corse contre les Turcs (1530-1650)". In Vergé-Franceschi, Michel; Graziani, Antoine-Marie. La guerre de course en Méditerranée (1515-1830) (in French). Paris: Presses de l'Université Paris IV-Sorbonne. pp. 73–144. ISBN 2-84050-167-8.
  2. ↑ Graziani, Antoine-Marie (1992). Les Tours Littorales (in French and Italian). Ajaccio, France: Alain Piazzola. p. 136, no. 67. ISBN 2-907161-06-7.
  3. ↑ Gregorovius, Ferdinand (1855). Corsica: Picturesque, Historical, and Social: with a Sketch of the Early Life of Napoleon, and an Account of the Bonaparte, Paoli, Pozzo Di Borgo, and Other Principal Families. Philadelphia: John E. Potter. p. 188.
  4. ↑ "Monuments historiques: Tour de Nonza ou de Torra" (in French). Ministère de la culture. Retrieved 4 May 2014..

Further reading

External links


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