Piazza Cavour

While Piazza Tre Martiri was the original heart of the city from its founding, and is the bigger square, Piazza Cavour became the centre of the city’s commercial and political life in the early middle ages and remains hugely important in the city’s social, political and commercial life.
This was the original palatium Comunis where the city’s Grand Council would meet.
The square’s importance started out with the building of the Palazzo dell’Arengo between 1204 and 1207.. Piazza Cavour (or Campo del Comune as it was known, in the Venetian style) developed with the building of the Palazzo del Podestá in 1330 and with the contsruction in the 1400s of the nearby Castel Sismondo, but the square really started to take its present shape and form from the 16th century onwards.
Nowadays, the square is one of the social hubs of the city. Numerous bars and shops flank the square. In one side of the square, there are the historical buildings: Garampi Palace, Arengo Palace and Podestà Palace.
In the square there is still The Pigna fountain, that was constructed in its current form (a fountain here dates back to roman times) by Giovanni da Carrara in 1543.
In the centre of the square there is still the statue of Pope Paul V, built in 1614 – a reminder that for much of its history Rimini fell directly under the control of the Papacy.
The Forum is also dominated by the memory of Julius Caesar, evoked by two modern signs: the statue in bronze and the stone milestone at the head of via IV Novembre. According to tradition (but never confirmed in any report written by the general himself) he would harangue his army in the very Forum of Ariminum following the passage of the Rubicon, in 49 BD.