Mezzovico-Vira

Geschichte

Mezzovico-Vira is a municipality in the district of Lugano in the canton of Ticino in Switzerland.HistoryA recently discovered stele with inscriptions in northern Etruscan suggests that the area around Mezzovico-Vira was already settled in the pre-Roman era. An archaeological investigation under the parish church of S. Abbondio in 1990, discovered Roman urn graves. The church developed from a small wooden church in the 6th Century to the current baroque building.In the Early Middle Ages it was a curtis, consisting of the villa (Vira), the vicus in the middle (Mezzovico) and the settlement of Sigirino. In the Middle Ages it belonged to the valley community of Carvina, which included the villages of the upper north end of Vedeggio. The modern municipality of Mezzovico-Vira is first mentioned in 1335 as Medio Vico and Vira.The political and religious center of the valley was Bironico. Mezzovico and Vira were always one municipality, but separated religiously when the Church of San Antonio in Vira became a parish church in 1838. The parish church of Mezzovico, S. Mamete goes back to a Roman era building has was expanded in the 12th, 15th and 16th Centuries.