I vicoli ciechi, elementi fondativi della città mediterranea medievale = Blind Alleys: Foundational Elements of the Medieval Mediterranean City

Marco Cadinu

2024-01-01

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Abstract

The residential areas of mediaeval cities, whether the geometrialised ones of European traditions or the organic ones typical of Islamic cities, are subject to the dynamics resulting from the interaction of family groups that, more or less influential, compete for urban space. Storia dell’Urbanistica n. 16/2024 While in the development of European cities, street organisation progressively prevails in the design of the general figure, and neighbourhoods are brought back into neighbourhoods or streets, in the Islamic city the urban sectors of primitive influence persist, especially thanks to the affirmation of the neighbourhood units of which the blind alleyes represent the social substance and preserve their planimetric identity over time. In these areas one recognises the founding parts of residential fabrics that, despite their planimetric complexity, respond to precise rules of social and urban organisation.