Columbus still lives here

His childhood in vico di Ponticello
Although the house where Columbus moved to with his family was near the boundary walls and therefore still removed from the centre of the city and from the harbour, it was certainly more central than the house in Porta dell'Olivella (which Domenico was to sell in 1470, but was only completely paid for in 1480).

About halfway up the alley was the timber market with its cumbersome merchandise; passing through this and Porta dell'Arco one reached the roads leading to the Bisagno plain on the west. 

In this village which was less built-up than the centre could be found, besides the craftsmens' shops, also less profitable trades which required larger spaces.  In this second dwelling-place, Columbus' father himself, besides weaving woollen cloth, also sold cheese and wine.

The house as it stood
Today this area has also been completely transformed. Much has been demolished and high buildings erected. Only the upper part of 'Vico dritto di Ponticello' remains.

The house was situated on the right hand side ascending but when research in the archives at the end of the nineteenth century ascertained its exact position, although the alley still existed, the house had already been altered and transformed.  This was probably due to being damaged during bombings by the French in 1684. In fact, the building had been raised to five storeys, one added at the end of the eighteenth century and the others perhaps previously.

In Columbus' day it was probably a two-storey house; on the ground floor near a narrow entrance was the workshop.  The front was merely a few yards wide, according to the model of poorer houses in Genoa at the time; in place of the two windows visible today there was only one, divided by a narrow column.

The small back garden with the well, mentioned in the papers, was probably on a level with the first floor.

Just a short distance from Porta Soprana stood the building which incorporated Christopher Columbus' house.  Over the centuries most buildings in the district were raised as had happened to many other Geniese constructions; thus, during the seventeenth century three storeys were added to the original two of the house already in existence.

In 1887 it was changed radically to assume its present proportions, which probably are more similar to the dimensions of the house as it stood during the fifteenth century.