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Albenga – An alley of the old city

From Wikipedia

Albenga is a city and comune situated on the Gulf of Genoa on the Italian Riviera in the Province of Savona in Liguria, northern Italy. The economy is mostly based on tourism, local commerce and agriculture. Albenga has 6 hamlet San Fedele, Lusignano, Campochiesa, Leca, Bastia, Salea..
A settlement of pre-Roman origins on the west side of the Ligurian coast, it was founded around the 4th century BC on the slopes of the coastal hills, becoming the capital of the Ingauni Ligures tribe, who dedicated to marine activities and controlled a large territory between Finale and Sanremo.
During the Second Punic War the city allied itself with the Carthaginians, but were defeated by the Romans under proconsul Lucius Aemilius Paullus Macedonicus in 181 BC. The following year the Romans and the Ingauni signed a foedus (alliance agreement) which began the total Romanization of the whole region. Put under Latin rights in 89 BC, Albingaunum was granted the Roman citizenship in 45 BC under Julius Caesar, starting to enjoy, with the beginning of the Empire, a period of prosperity. A further boost for the city came from the building of the Via Julia Augusta (13 BC), connecting it to southern France and Spain. In the meantime the intense exploitation of the flat land around the city continued.
During the 5th century, the city suffered the raids of the Visigoths, who partly destroyed and sacked it. The old Municipium, turned in disastrous conditions, was rebuilt for the intervention of emperor Constantius III who gave the city stability and a difensive structure that allowed it to survive and to go through the events of the following centuries. Albenga established itself as a commune in 1098; in that same year it took part to the First Crusade with vessels, men and money, receiving rights of free trade by the King of Jerusalem. From that moment on, the Golden Red Cross coat of arms waved on its ship and on its towers.
Later on, after the invasion of northern Italy by emperor Frederick Barbarossa, the city supported him thanks to its Ghibelline allegiance, which was never abandoned during the following centuries. In 1159 it receiving the imperial investiture for all its territory.
In 1798 Albenga was declared capital of the Centa Jurisdiction, as part of the short living constitution of the Ligurian Republic. In 1815 the city, together with the whole Liguria, was assigned to the Savoyard Kingdom of Sardinia, becoming the capital of a province including Andora and Finale Ligure.
In 1863, after the unification of Italy, the province was reduced to a district, and was abolished at all in 1927. At the time Albenga had reduced into an agricultural village, overtaken by other coastal towns for what concerned both economic and demographic development, due to their superior touristic appeal.
Besides being an important historical town, Albenga is a coastal and touristic resort town of the Riviera Ligure. Its coasts has a length of some 4 km of fine sand mixed with pebbles, with bathing establishments, divided in small public beaches and other managed and fully equipped. The sea promenade is 3 km-long promenade where.