Palazzo Cornazzani

• 1. Introduction

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  Palazzo Cornazzani stands in Pavia, a city in Lombardy, and it carries a distinction that surprises most visitors. Albert Einstein once lived here, as a teenager, during his family's time in the city. What drew the young Einstein to a Gothic palace in northern Italy? To answer that question, one must travel back five centuries. The palace's long history of extraordinary residents did not begin with Einstein.

• 2. A Noble Inheritance

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  The Beccaria family, aristocrats with a foothold in the region, were the first recorded owners of the building. In the 16th century, the palace passed from them to the Cornazzani through marriage. The Cornazzani had their roots in Parma, but their careers unfolded in service to the great powers of northern Italy. They worked first under Filippo Maria Visconti and then under the Sforza, and that sustained loyalty earned them Milanese citizenship. A branch of the family eventually put down roots in Pavia, and they made the palace their permanent home. Among those who visited was Antonio de Guzmán, the governor of Milan. His presence is a measure of the social standing the Cornazzani had accumulated.

• 3. Illustrious Residents

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  Cardinal Michele Bonelli apparently spent more than a year in the Pavia palace, which was unusual even among distinguished guests. Ugo Foscolo was another who made the building his home, living there during the years he held a professorship at the University of Pavia. He was accompanied by his friend Giulio Gabrielli di Montevecchio. Foscolo's presence proved so defining that the palace acquired a second name: Casa del Foscolo. The street where the building stands was later named after him as well. In later decades, the professor Contardo Ferrini and the poet Ada Negri both lived in the palace at different times. The next extraordinary resident would earn a very different kind of fame from the poets and cardinals who came before him.

• 4. Einstein's Pavia Year

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  Hermann Einstein, Albert's father, had brought the family to Pavia to oversee a factory that manufactured electric machines. The city gave the young Albert a new setting for his curiosity, and he put it to use. During his time at Palazzo Cornazzani, between 1895 and 1896, he wrote a short essay. He gave it the title "On the Investigation of the State of the Ether in a Magnetic Field." The palace that provided this workspace had its own layered story, one told in stone and fresco rather than scientific notation.

• 5. Gothic Stone and Baroque Fresco

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  Two courtyards give the palace its internal structure. Octagonal granite columns line the portico of the first, a 15th-century design common across Lombard construction of the period. Numerous frescoes enrich the surrounding walls. On the northern side of the portico, a Gothic-style loggia has survived, its roof supported on the balcony by wooden columns. A second courtyard, added in the 17th century, extends the building beyond this older space. In its lunettes, the Cornazzani coat of arms appears in fresco. The plastered exterior facade carries a 15th-century terracotta tile depicting the Nativity. Inside, coffered ceilings from the 15th century sit alongside Baroque frescoes and a neoclassical wing. The terracotta Nativity tile embedded in that plastered facade has overlooked five centuries of remarkable comings and goings. It continues to do so today.