Italian Naval Academy
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| Type | Naval Academy |
|---|---|
| Established | November 6, 1881 |
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Officer in charge
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Divisional admiral Giuseppe Cavo Dragone |
| Location | Livorno, Italy |
| Website | www.marina.difesa.it |
Coordinates: 43°31′37″N 10°18′29″E / 43.527°N 10.308°E
The Italian Naval Academy (Italian: Accademia Navale) is a coeducational military university in Livorno, which is responsible for the technical training of military officers of the Italian Navy.
The Naval Academy stands on the former site of the Hospital of St. James, built in the 1640s for the quarantine of ships' crews from the Levant, which were previously diverted to the islands of Giglio and Elba.
The Hospital of St. Leopold was designed by Ignatius Fazzi and built a little further south in 1773, by order of Leopold II. It was equipped with several towers, one of which served to guard the coast, two chapels and two cemeteries. It remained an active hospital until 1846. Before it was incorporated in the Academy in 1913, it was first transformed into a prison and then a military barracks.
The new hospital was considered one of the best in Europe. In the entrance, above a Baroque arch, a marble plaque still commemorates the usefulness of a public health and navigation, "Petrus Leopuldus Arch Austr. Hung. Boem. RP Magnus Etruria. Dux navigationis et hominibus salutis publicae Vindex mercibusque graviora pestilentiae suspicion notatis tutius expurgandis remotiorem hanc er Insulam porticus designavit construxit ann. MDCCLXXIII.
The hospital was laid out in a trapezoidal plan and surrounded by a dry moat and high wall. The corner towers served as defense.
Inside, the health complex was divided into two distinct zones. One consisted of the palace housing the officers, which still exists today, with a semicircular facade facing the entrance to the dock. At the center of the dock entrance, isolated in the water, sat the tower of San Rocco (destroyed during World War II), which was connected by a wooden walkway. There were also large sheds for the storage of goods in quarantine, a circular chapel, and a menagerie for animals. In this area, near the sheds, was a marble statue of Grand Duke Pietro Leopoldo, dressed as Roman centurion and placed in a rich marble niche, which was transferred, to where it stands today in the square of the churchyard of St. James. Further south, the other section, "La Gabbia", was isolated by a ditch from the rest of the complex. Here, the patients infected with plague and goods were separated out.
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Wikipedia