Piedmont

 ( Nuts 2 Statistical Regions Of The European Union ) 

Piedmont ( ; ; ) is one of the 20 regions of Italy, located in the northwest Italy. It borders the Liguria region to the south, the Lombardy and Emilia-Romagna regions to the east, and the Aosta Valley region to the northwest. Piedmont also borders Switzerland to the north and France to the west.

Piedmont has an area of , making it the second-largest region of Italy after Sicily. It has 4,255,702 inhabitants as of 2025. The capital of Piedmont is Turin. This city was the first capital of the Kingdom of Italy, from 1861 to 1865.

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Toponymy The French Piedmont, the Italian Piemonte, and other variant cognates come from the medieval Latin Pedemontium or Pedemontis, i.e. ad pedem montium, meaning "at the foot of the mountains" (referring to the Alps), attested in documents from the end of the 12th century.

Touring club italiano (1976). 9788836500017, Touring Editore. . ISBN 9788836500017

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Geography Piedmont is surrounded on three sides by the Alps, including Monte Viso, where the Po River rises, and Monte Rosa. It borders France (Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes and Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur), Switzerland (Ticino and Valais), and the Italian regions of Lombardy, Liguria, Aosta Valley, and for a very small part with Emilia Romagna. The geography of Piedmont is 43.3% mountainous, along with extensive areas of hills (30.3%) and plains (26.4%).

Piedmont is the second largest of Italy's 20 regions, after Sicily. It is broadly coincident with the upper part of the drainage basin of the river Po River, which rises from the slopes of Monviso in the west of the region and is Italy's largest river. The Po drains the semicircle formed by the Alps and Apennines, which surround the region on three sides.

The countryside is very diverse: from the rugged peaks of the massifs of Monte Rosa and Gran Paradiso to the damp rice paddies of Vercelli and Novara, from the gentle hillsides of the Langhe, Roero, and Montferrat to the plains. 7.6% of the entire territory is considered protected area. There are 56 different national or regional parks; one of the most famous is the Gran Paradiso National Park, between Piedmont and the Aosta Valley.

Piedmont has a typically temperate climate, which on the Alps becomes progressively temperate-cold and colder as it climbs to altitude. In areas located at low altitudes, winters are relatively cold but not very rainy and often sunny, with the possibility of snowfall, sometimes abundant. Snowfall, on the other hand, is less frequent and occasional in the northeast areas. Summers are hot with local possibilities of strong thunderstorms.

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Major towns and cities

1	Turin	875,698	130.17	6,786	239	TO
2	Novara	104,411	103.05	1,013	162	NO
3	Alessandria	93,884	203.97	460	95	AL
4	Asti	76,424	151.82	504	123	AT
5	Moncalieri	57,060	47.63	1,197	260	TO
6	Cuneo	56,116	119.88	468	534	CN
7	Collegno	49,940	18.12	2,756	302	TO
8	Rivoli	48,819	29.52	1,653	390	TO
9	Nichelino	48,182	20.64	2,334	229	TO
10	Settimo Torinese	47,704	32.37	1,473	207	TO

Below are listed other towns of Piedmont with more than 20,000 inhabitants sorted by population.

11	Vercelli	46,808	79.85	586	130	VC
12	Biella	44,860	46.68	961	417	BI
13	Grugliasco	37,906	13.12	2,889	293	TO
14	Chieri	36,778	54.30	677	305	TO
15	Pinerolo	35,778	50.28	711	376	TO
16	Casale Monferrato	34,565	86.32	400	116	AL
17	Venaria Reale	34,248	20.29	1,687	262	TO
18	Alba	31,419	54.01	581	172	CN
19	Verbania	30,933	36.62	844	197	VB
20	Bra	29,705	59.61	498	285	CN
21	Carmagnola	29,052	96.38	301	240	TO
22	Novi Ligure	28,257	54.22	521	199	AL
23	Tortona	27,575	99.29	278	122	AL
24	Chivasso	26,704	51.31	520	183	TO
25	Fossano	24,743	130.72	189	375	CN
26	Ivrea	23,598	30.19	781	253	TO
27	Orbassano	23,240	22.05	1,053	273	TO
28	Mondovì	22,592	87.25	258	395	CN
29	Borgomanero	21,709	32.36	670	307	NO
30	Savigliano	21,306	110.73	192	321	CN
31	Trecate	20,329	38.38	529	136	NO
32	Acqui Terme	20,054	33.30	602	156	AL

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History Piedmont was inhabited in early historic times by Celts-Ligures tribes such as the Taurini and the Salassi. They were later subdued by the ancient Rome (), who founded several colonies there including Augusta Taurinorum (Turin) and Eporedia (Ivrea). After the fall of the Western Roman Empire, the region was successively invaded by the Burgundians, the Ostrogoths (5th century), Byzantine Empire, Lombards (6th century), and Franks (773).

In the 9th–10th centuries there were further incursions by the Magyars, Saracens and Muslim Moors.

At the time Piedmont, as part of the Kingdom of Italy within the Holy Roman Empire, was subdivided into several marches and counties. In 1046, Otto of Savoy added Piedmont to the County of Savoy, with a capital at Chambéry (now in France). Other areas remained independent, such as the powerful comune (municipalities) of Asti and Alessandria and the marquisates of Saluzzo and Montferrat. The County of Savoy became the Duchy of Savoy in 1416, and Duke Emanuele Filiberto moved the seat to Turin in 1563. In 1720, the Duke of Savoy became King of Sardinia, founding what evolved into the Kingdom of Sardinia and increasing Turin's importance as a European capital.

The Republic of Alba was created in 1796 as a French client republic in Piedmont. A new client republic, the Piedmontese Republic, existed between 1798 and 1799 before it was reoccupied by Austrian and Russian troops. In June 1800, a third client republic, the Subalpine Republic, was established in Piedmont. It fell under full French control in 1801, and France annexed it in September 1802. In the Congress of Vienna, the Kingdom of Sardinia was restored and furthermore received the Republic of Genoa to strengthen it as a barrier against France.

Piedmont was a springboard for Italian unification in 1859–1861, following earlier unsuccessful wars against the Austrian Empire in 1820–1821, and 1848–1849. This process is sometimes referred to as Piedmontisation.Collier, p. 75. The efforts were later countered by the efforts of rural farmers.Valeria Fargion, From the Southern to the Northern Question: Territorial and Social Politics in Italy , paper presented at the RC 19 conference 'Welfare state restructuring: processes and social outcomes', 2–4 September 2004, Sciences-Po Paris. Retrieved 7 January 2007.Anna Bull, Regionalism in Italy , Europa 2(4). Retrieved 7 January 2007. The House of Savoy became Kings of Italy, and Turin briefly became the capital of Italy. However, when the Italian capital was moved to Florence, and then to Rome, the administrative and institutional importance of Piedmont was reduced. The only recognition of Piedmont's historical role was that the crown prince of Italy was known as the Prince of Piedmont. After Italian unification, Piedmont was one of the most important regions in the first Italian industrialization.Marco Meriggi, (1996). Breve Storia dell'Italia Settentrionale, dall'Ottocento a Oggi. 1st ed. Italy: Donzelli Dditore, Rome.

File:Exterior of the Palazzina di caccia of Stupinigi.jpg|The Palazzina di caccia of Stupinigi in Nichelino is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. File:Sacra di San Michele07.jpg|The Sacra di San Michele is a symbol of Piedmont.

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Economy The gross domestic product (GDP) of the region was 137.4 billion euros in 2018, accounting for 7.8% of Italy's GDP. GDP per capita at purchasing power parity was 31,300 euros or 104% of the EU27 average in the same year. The GDP per employee was 111% of the EU average. Since 2006, the Piemonte Agency for Investments, Export and Tourism began to facilitate outside investment and promote Piedmont's industry and tourism. It was the first Italian institution to combine the activities being carried out by pre-existing local organizations to promote the territory internationally.

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Automotive The region contains major industrial centres, the most important of which is Turin, home to the Fiat conglomerate, but mass-market Fiat cars are not produced anymore, only small-scale manufacturing of luxury Maserati cars (36,702 in 2020). Most of the ex-Fiat plants now belong to other companies: aerospace is owned by Leonardo S.p.A., turbo jet engines by General Electric, high-speed trains by Alstom, bearings by SKF. Fiat does not exist anymore as an independent company; car production belongs to Stellantis, and trucks, buses, tractors, agriculture and construction machines are produced by the independent company CNH Industrial (most manufacturing activity takes place in the United States, in Piedmont only the production of New Holland excavators in San Mauro Torinese and Iveco diesel engines in Turin). Neither of them are headquartered in Turin anymore, however, some research and development centres are still working.

Formerly famous automotive design companies also were sold to global automotive groups: Italdesign Giugiaro to Volkswagen, Ghia to Ford, Pininfarina to Mahindra; Gruppo Bertone went into bankruptcy in 2014. The massive decline in the automotive industry caused other regions like Veneto (€163 billion in 2018) and Emilia-Romagna (€161 billion in 2018) to surpass Piedmont (€137 billion in 2018) in GDP and led to relative high unemployment. The peak of Italian motor vehicle production is reached in 1989 with 2.22 million units, but in 2019 (before the COVID-19 pandemic in Italy) it was only 0.92 million units. Even existing Italian car production now relocated to Southern Italy, such as in Pomigliano d'Arco (140,478 in 2020), Melfi (229,848 in 2020), and Atessa (257,026 in 2020), because of cost cutting.

There are some automotive suppliers of:

• exhaust systems, electronic systems, suspension systems and automotive lighting in Venaria Reale and Rivalta di Torino from Magneti Marelli
• dual-clutch transmission, gearboxes, drivelines and their mechatronics components from Dana Graziano
• bearings from SKF
• tires (Michelin and Pirelli)

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Electronics and industrial equipment There are some important companies in high-tech manufacturing: Comau (industrial robots) and Prima Industrie (laser equipment). Silicon wafer production is in Novara by MEMC. Olivetti, once a major electronics industry whose plants were in Scarmagno and Ivrea, has now turned into a small-scale computer service company and no longer produces computers. Leonardo Elettronica in Turin-Caselle develops and manufactures airborne mission systems and airborne computers. Machine building has a long tradition in Piedmont with the manufacturing of excavators, telescopic handlers, industrial refrigerators, printing machines, paper machines, packaging machines, glass machines, turbines, and high-speed trains.