Imperia

 ( Coastal Towns In Liguria ) 

Porto Maurizio was a Roman settlement, Portus Maurici, which, though named in the brief maritime itinerary appended to the Antonine Itinerary,Noted in William Smith, A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography, vol 2 1873:187, s.v. "Liguria" must be an interpolation in manuscripts of that third century document, since it is named after Saint Maurice, leader of the Theban Legion who were not martyred until 286 and could not have been memorialized until the Christianized Empire of the fourth century."Portus Maurici, dessen Name auf christliche Zeitalter hindeutet" (Konrad Mannert, Geographie der Griechen und Römen aus Ihren Schriften, Volume 9, Part 1 Book 3, 1823:276); Domenico Anfossi, De sacrarum reliquiarum cultu (1610) suggests a deformation of Maurorum Portus in a passage quoted extensively in Giuseppe Figari, Saggi cronologici della città del Porto-Maurizio 1810:13. It became a Byzantine port after the Gothic Wars of the 6th century, then passed to the Order of Saint Benedict. It was subject to the counts of Turin in the 11th century, and then to the marchesi of Clavesana. Boniface of Clavesana sold the town to the Republic of Genoa in 1288An earlier notice in the continuator of Caffaro's Annals of Genoa, under the year 1204 and other years, is mentioned in Peter Wesseling's notices of the Antonine Itinerary, Vetera Romanorum itineraria, sive Antonini Augusti itinerarium (Amsterdam 1735:502) s.v. "Portus Maurici". in return for a yearly payment, as part of Genoa's expansion into western Liguria. In 1354 it became the seat of the Genoese vicar of the western Riviera. The town prospered even though control of Genoa passed between the French, the Duchy of Milan, and the Spanish. During the Napoleonic Wars Napoleon Bonaparte himself stopped for a night in Porto Maurizio and spent the night on the Parrasio on the third floor of Palazzo Lavagna. At the Congress of Vienna in 1815, it was awarded to the Kingdom of Sardinia, before finally joining a united Italy in 1861.

Mussolini created the city of Imperia on 21 October 1923 by the union of Porto Maurizio and Oneglia and the surrounding village communes of Piani, Caramagna Ligure, Castelvecchio di Santa Maria Maggiore, Borgo Sant'Agata, Costa d'Oneglia, Poggi, Torrazza, Moltedo and Montegrazie.

Porto Maurizio is situated on a peninsula to the west of the river, stretching along the coastline. It is the wealthiest and most colorful district of the city, threaded by narrow lanes known as carrugi, and its economy centers on the tourist industry. It was a possession of Genoa from the 13th century.

Oneglia ( Inéja in Ligurian) lies on an alluvial plain to the east of the Impero, and with its working port is the most modern and industrialized of the two districts. At its centre lies Dante Square, from which radiate some of the main roads of the city.

• Cathedral of San Maurizio, built between 1781 and 1832 by Gaetano Canton, the largest church in Liguria[1]
• Old Town, called Parasio
• Convent of Santa Chiara, first established in 1365, the existing structure dates from 1741
• There is a small Naval Museum in the town

• Museo dell' Olivo ( The Museum of the Olive)
• Villa Grock, built for the clown Grock (1880–1959)
• Church of San Giovanni Battista, built in 1739–62.
• Calata Giovanni Battista Cuneo, a historic quay lined with restaurants
• The historic Palazzo Municipale in Piazza Danta.

• Church of Santa Maria Maggiore
• Shrine of Nostra Signora delle Grazie

Bus services across the Province of Imperia are operated by the public transport body Riviera Trasporti (RT).

The Genoa–Ventimiglia railway line runs through Imperia: the city is served by a central Imperia railway station, on a double-track route opened on 11 December 2016, replacing the old narrow coastal route confined by the sea and long tunnels under the rocky coastline, and therefore built as a single-track railway. The old route was originally built in 1872 and closed with the opening of the new inland route; the city was served by two railway stations serving the two centres of Imperia, and Imperia Oneglia railway station.