Originally called Plaça Real or also Plaça del Pou Vell (of the Old Well), it has been the beating heart of the city for centuries and remains, to this day, the centerpiece of the Old Town. Institutional offices including the Municipal House and the Royal Customs House overlooked it, as well as the homes of Alghero’s notables. Bounding its perimeter on the south side are the 15th-century Palazzo De Ferrera with its elegant Gothic lines, which housed Emperor Charles V in 1541; the back façade of the Casa de la Ciutat (Town Hall) and the former seat of the Royal Customs House; and, higher up, the 19th-century Palazzo Serra, with its monumental tympanum portal in which neoclassical and Baroque elements coexist. On the north side is the Lavagna Palace, distinguished by its 1866 sundial, and the Bolasco Palace, which in the mid-19th century was owned by Giuseppe Garibaldi’s family members. Since the 1400s the entrance from the harbor to the fortress city was provided by the Portal de la Mar, through which boats could be rescued in the event of exceptional storm surges, hence the name Porto Salvo (or Salve)
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