PADUA, a city of northern Italy (Lat. Patavium [q.v.]; Ital. Padova), on the river Bacchiglione, 25 m. W. of Venice and 18 M. S.E. of Vicenza. Pop. (1931) 57,172 (town), 131,066 (commune). The city is picturesque, with arcaded streets, and many bridges crossing the various branches of the Bacchiglione, which once surrounded the ancient walls. The Palazzo della Ragione (1218-9) has a great hall on the upper floor; its length is 2671 ft., its breadth 89 ft., and its height 78 ft.; the walls are covered with symbolical paintings in fresco, originally by Giotto; the building stands upon arches, and the upper storey is surrounded by an open loggia. In 1306 Fra Giovanni, an Augustinian friar, covered the whole with one roof curved like the hull of a ship; originally there were three roofs, spanning the three chambers into which the hall was at first divided ; the in ternal partition walls remained till the fire of 1420, when the Venetian architects who undertook the restoration removed them. In the Piazza dei Signori, now called Unita d'Italia, is the beauti ful loggia called the Gran Guardia (1493-1526) and close by is the Palazzo del Capitanio, the residence of the Venetian governors, with its great door, the work of Falconetto of Verona, 1532.
The most famous of the Paduan churches is the basilica dedi cated to Saint Anthony, commonly called Il Santo ; the bones of the saint rest in a chapel richly ornamented with carved marbles, the work of various artists, among them of Sansovino and Fal conetto ; the basilica was begun after his death in 1231 and com pleted in the following century; it is covered by seven cupolas. In the piazza in front of the church is Donatello's magnificent equestrian statue of Erasmo da Narni, the Venetian general (d. 1443). The Eremitani is an Augustinian church of the 13th century, containing the tombs of Jacopo (135o) and Ubertino (1345) da Carrara, lords of Padua, and the chapel of SS. James and Christopher, with Mantegna's frescoes. Close by the Ere mitani is the small church of the Annunziata, known as the Ma donna dell' Arena; the interior is entirely covered with paintings by Giotto. Padua has long been famous for its university, founded in 1222. Among the professors and alumni were Bembo, Sperone Speroni, Veselius, Acquapendente, Galileo, Pomponazzi, Pole, Scaliger, Tasso and Sobieski. In 1925-6 it had 2,439 students. The presence of the university attracted many distinguished art ists, as Giotto, Lippo Lippi and Donatello; and for native art there was the school of Squarcione (1394-1474); whence issued the great Mantegna (1431-1506). There is an important pic
ture gallery. The botanical garden (1545) is the oldest in Europe. Corn and saw mills, distilleries, chemical factories, breweries, candle-works, ink-works, foundries, agricultural machine and automobile works flourish.
At the Diet of Aix-la-Chapelle (828) the duchy and march of Friuli, in which Padua lay, was divided into four counties, one of which took its title from that city. At the beginning of the iith century the citizens established a constitution, composed of a general council or legislative assembly and a credenza or execu tive; and during the next century they were engaged in wars with Venice and Vicenza for the right of water-way on the Bacchigli one and the Brenta—so that, on the one hand, the city grew in power and self-reliance, while, on the other, the great families of Camposampiero, D'Este and Da Romano began to emerge and to divide the Paduan district between them. The citizens, in order to protect their liberties, were obliged to elect a podesta, and their choice fell first on one of the D'Este family (c. 1175);` but in 1237 Frederick II. established his vicar Ezzelino da Romano in Padua and the neighbouring cities.
When Ezzelino met his death, in 1256, Padua enjoyed a brief period of rest and prosperity : the university flourished ; the basilica of the saint was begun; the Paduans became masters of Vicenza. But this advance brought them into dangerous proxim ity to Can Grande della Scala, lord of Verona, to whom they had to yield in 1311. As a reward for freeing the city from the Scalas, Jacopo da Carrara was elected lord of Padua in 1318. From that date till 2405, with the exception of two years (1388 1390) when Gian Galeazzo Visconti held the town, nine members of the Carrara family succeeded one another as lords of the city.
Padua passed under Venetian rule in 1405, and so remained, with a brief interval during the wars of the League of Cambray, till the fall of the republic in 1797. The city was governed by two Venetian nobles, a podesta, for civil and a captain for military affairs; each of these was elected for sixteen months. Under these governors the great and small councils continued to discharge municipal business and to administer the Paduan statutes of 1276 and 1362. For history after 1797 see VENICE.
See G. Verci, Storia della Marca Trevigiana (Venice, 1786) ; Abate G. Gennari, Annali di Padova (Padua) ; G. Cittadella, Storia della dominazione carrarese (Padua, 1842) ; B. Gonzati, La Basilica di Sant' Antonio di Padova (Padua, 1853).