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 neighbourhood, and an Italian town can be now subdivided into a larger number of ''quartieri''. The Swiss town of

Lugano Lugano (, , ; lmo, label=Ticinese dialect, Ticinese, Lugan ) is a city and municipality in Switzerland, part of the Lugano District in the canton of Ticino. It is the largest city of both Ticino and the Italian-speaking southern Switzerland. Luga ...

(in the Italian-speaking canton of Ticino) is also subdivided into quarters.Lugano
quartieri The English word "

quarter A quarter is one-fourth, , 25% or 0.25. Quarter or quarters may refer to: Places * Quarter (urban subdivision), a section or area, usually of a town Placenames * Quarter, South Lanarkshire, a settlement in Scotland * Le Quartier, a settlement i ...

" to mean an urban neighbourhood (e.g. the French Quarter in

New Orleans New Orleans ( , ,New Orleans
Merriam-Webster. ; french: La Nouvelle-Orléans , es, Nuev ...

Louisiana Louisiana , group=pronunciation (French: ''La Louisiane'') is a state in the Deep South and South Central regions of the United States. It is the 20th-smallest by area and the 25th most populous of the 50 U.S. states. Louisiana is borde ...

) is derived from the cognate old French word "quartier". Other Italian towns with other than four official neighbourhoods are frequently divided into analogous terzieri (3) or sestieri (6); some towns merely refer to these neighborhoods by the non-number-specific ''

rioni The Rioni ( ka, რიონი, ; , ) is the main river of western Georgia (country), Georgia. It originates in the Caucasus Mountains, in the region of Racha and flows west to the Black Sea, entering it north of the city of Poti (near ancient P ...

''. ''Quartieri'', ''terzieri'', ''sestieri'', ''rioni'', and their analogues are usually no longer administrative divisions of these towns, but historical and traditional communities. Sometimes towns maintain traditional cultural events linked to quartieri: a notable case is the

palio Palio is the name given in Italy to an annual athletic contest, very often of a historical character, pitting the neighbourhoods of a town or the hamlets of a ''comune'' against each other. Typically, they are fought in costume and commemorate som ...

Siena Siena ( , ; lat, Sena Iulia) is a city in Tuscany, Italy. It is the capital of the province of Siena. The city is historically linked to commercial and banking activities, having been a major banking center until the 13th and 14th centuri ...

. Only in a few Italian cities, like in

Florence Florence ( ; it, Firenze ) is a city in Central Italy and the capital city of the Tuscany region. It is the most populated city in Tuscany, with 383,083 inhabitants in 2016, and over 1,520,000 in its metropolitan area.Bilancio demografico an ...

and

Bologna Bologna (, , ; egl, label= Emilian, Bulåggna ; lat, Bononia) is the capital and largest city of the Emilia-Romagna region in Northern Italy. It is the seventh most populous city in Italy with about 400,000 inhabitants and 150 different nat ...

, a ''quartiere'' is also an

administrative subdivision Administrative division, administrative unit,Article 3(1). country subdivision, administrative region, subnational entity, constituent state, as well as many similar terms, are generic names for geographical areas into which a particular, ind ...

References

{{Italy topics, state=collapsed . Subdivisions of Italy Subdivisions of Ticino

See also

References