Brera is a district ("
quartiere
A (; plural: ) is a territorial subdivision of certain Italian towns. The word derives from (‘fourth’) and was thus properly used only for towns divided into four neighborhoods by the two main roads. It has been later used as a synonymous ...
") of
Milan
Milan ( , , Lombard: ; it, Milano ) is a city in northern Italy, capital of Lombardy, and the second-most populous city proper in Italy after Rome. The city proper has a population of about 1.4 million, while its metropolitan city h ...
,
Italy
Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical re ...
. It is located within the
Zone 1 (the historical core of the city) and it is centred on Via ''Brera''. The name stems from Medieval Italian "braida" or "brera", derived from Old
Lombardic "brayda" (often Latinized as "praedium"), meaning a land expanse either cleared of trees or naturally lacking them. This is because around the year 900, the Brera district was situated just outside Milan's city walls and was kept clear for military reasons. The root of the word is the same as that of the Dutch city of
Breda
Breda () is a city and municipality in the southern part of the Netherlands, located in the province of North Brabant. The name derived from ''brede Aa'' ('wide Aa' or 'broad Aa') and refers to the confluence of the rivers Mark and Aa. Breda has ...
's name and the English word "broad".
Brera houses the
Brera Academy of Fine Arts and the
Brera Art Gallery, which prominently contributed to the development of Brera as an artists' neighbourhood and a place of
bohemian
Bohemian or Bohemians may refer to:
*Anything of or relating to Bohemia
Beer
* National Bohemian, a brand brewed by Pabst
* Bohemian, a brand of beer brewed by Molson Coors
Culture and arts
* Bohemianism, an unconventional lifestyle, origin ...
atmosphere, sometimes referred to as "the milanese
Montmartre
Montmartre ( , ) is a large hill in Paris's northern 18th arrondissement. It is high and gives its name to the surrounding district, part of the Right Bank. The historic district established by the City of Paris in 1995 is bordered by Rue Ca ...
". Both the academy and the gallery are located in
Palazzo Brera
Palazzo Brera or Palazzo di Brera is a monumental palace in Milan, in Lombardy in northern Italy. It was a Jesuit college for two hundred years. It now houses several cultural institutions including the Accademia di Brera, the art academy of ...
, the main historical building of the area; this same building also houses
Milan's botanical garden as well as
an astronomical observatory and the
Braidense National Library. Other features that contribute to the character of Brera include restaurants, bars, nightclubs, antique and art shops, colourful street markets, as well as
fortune teller
Fortune telling is the practice of prediction, predicting information about a person's life.J. Gordon Melton, Melton, J. Gordon. (2008). ''The Encyclopedia of Religious Phenomena''. Visible Ink Press. pp. 115-116. The scope of fortune telling ...
s' booths.
From 1998 to 2002 novelist
Paolo Brera, along with Franco Brera and Francesca Brera, edited and published the magazine ''Brera'', devoted to the Brera district.
Well-known journalists, art critics and fiction writers contributed over the years, including Rossana Bossaglia,
Giuseppe Pontiggia
Giuseppe Pontiggia (; 25 September 1934 – 27 June 2003) was an Italian writer and literary critic.
Biography
He was born in Como, and moved to Milan with his family in 1948. In 1959 he graduated from the Università Cattolica in Milan with a ...
, Guido Vergani, Vittoria Colpi,
Carlo Castellaneta and Giulio Signori.
Footnotes
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Districts of Milan