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THE CITY OF OVADA

Main city of the Orba Valley and of the Stura Valley, Ovada is probably, for its urban system, the most Ligurian city of the province and is able to mediate between the elements by which it is composed so as to form an original and interesting whole together with its wonderful surroundings, like one of the destinations to be preferred in our territory.

At 192 m. on the sea level, Ovada can enjoy a particularly pleasant climate, far away from the fog that makes the plain part of the province quite famous: it is just this climate that allows the cultivation of the renown "Dolcetto di Ovada". In the past, the economy was based mostly on agriculture and on the breeding of silkworms that, especially in the XIX century, had become one of the main activities, like in most of the Northern Italy. Today Ovada can boast various mechanical and handicraft industries. The activity of furniture production and trade is a remarkable, and particularly very organized, one.

With origins that go back to the times of the Romans, a strategic and privileged place at the confluence of two torrents (the Orba and the Stura) and a point of almost obliged passage on the roads that bring to the sea from the plain, Ovada reminds also in its name the characteristics of the pass: "Vada" or "Vadum" indicated in fact the point of pass or the obliged way-through.

In 967 AC Ottone I donated it, together with the other territories of the Alto and of the Basso Monferrato, to the Marquis Aleramo. Passed afterwards to the Marquises of Gavi and, from these, to the Marquises Del Bosco, it reached the Malaspinas who, in 1277, sold it, and more than once, to the Republic of Genoa. Ovada followed therefore the fates of Ligurian Republic with the exception of a period of a few years when it stayed under the dominion of the Dukes of Milan, until the 1814 when, after the Wien Conference, it passed definitively under the sovereignty of the Reign of Sardinia.

In 1935, as a result of the collapse of the dam of Ortiglieto di Molare, that caused a flood on the Orba torrent, the entire area beyond Orba of Ovada was destroyed and tens of people died and many were dispersed. The second world war, with the occupation of the German troops, their reprisals and the bombings by the Allies, put the city on its knees but the Ovadese people have been able to stand up and reconstruct everything until becoming, from a productive and a tourist point of view, one of most active of our territory.

The Ligurian past can be traced in the urban and architectonic system of the historical centre, in the characteristic disposition of the houses and of the Genovese “carrugi”, with their solar, although faded-away, colours. Among the monuments it is necessary to remind:

- the ancient parochial church of San Sebastiano, now used no longer;

- the Oratory of the Santissima Trinità and of San Giovanni Battista;

- the church of the Concezione, also said “dei Padri Cappuccini”, after a vote made by the Ovadese population during the plague of 1631;

- the monumental parochial church of Nostra Signora dell’Assunta, the Oratory of the Santissima Annunziata, the church of Nostra Signora delle Grazie.

... and then the ancient noble palaces, the roads and the squares that give this small town, with their dedalic chasing each other, a unique atmosphere inside our province.