Lecco city is situated on “that side of the Lake of Como”. Exactly at the point where the lake ends and the river Adda continues its flow. The city is surrounded by mountains of extraordinary beauty, and its mild climate is typical of lake areas.
On Lake Como the capital of the province in Lombardy, northern Italy, 50 kilometres north of Milan. The lake narrows to form the river Adda, so bridges were built to improve road communications with Como and Milan. There are four bridges crossing the river Adda in Lecco: the Azzone Visconti Bridge (1336–1338), the Kennedy Bridge (1956) and the Alessandro Manzoni Bridge (1985) and a railroad bridge. Its economy used to be based on industry (iron manufacturers), but now it is mainly tertiary. Lecco was also Alpine Town of the Year 2013. Archaeological finds demonstrate the presence of Celtic settlement in the area before the arrival of the Romans. The latter built a castrum here and made it an important road hub. After the fall of the Western Roman Empire, the Lombards captured the town in the 6th century; they were followed by the Franks, who made Lecco the seat of a countship and, later, of a frontier Mark. Emperor Otto I spent a long time in this city, quenching the 964 revolt against the Holy Roman Empire led by Lecco’s count Attone. Later it became a possession of the Milanese monastery of St. Ambrose. Conrad II also stayed in Lecco, in the attempt to free it from the church, but as the result of the ensuing wars the city was subjected by Milan. It subsequently followed the history of the Duchy of Milan and of Lombardy. In the early 16th century it was briefly ruled by the condottiere Gian Giacomo Medici. Alessandro Manzoni set the events in the first half of The Betrothed in Lecco, a town he knew deeply since he had spent part of his childhood there. Which was so dear to Alessandro Manzoni, and where he set his great novel I Promessi Sposi.