Piedmont

Piedmont is a region of north-western Italy. It has an area of 25,400 km² and a population of est. 4.3 million. Its capital is Turin.

Piedmont is surrounded on three sides by the Alps mountain range, including the Monviso, where the Po river rises. It borders with France and the Italian regions of Lombardy, Liguria and Valle d'Aosta.

The region is divided into eight administrative provinces (Alessandria, Asti, Biella, Cuneo, Novara, Vercelli, Verbania and Torino), each named after its principal city. Other important cities include Moncalieri and Rivoli.

Lowland Piedmont is a fertile agricultural region, producing wheat, rice, maize and grapes: the region also contains major industrial centres, notably Turin, home to the FIAT automobile works.

From 1046 the main territory of the house of Savoy, (dukes of Savoy from 1416 and kings of Sardinia from 1720), Piedmont was the springboard for Italy's unification in 1859-1861, following earlier unsuccessful wars against Austria in 1820-1821 and 1848-1849.

Several towns in the United States are called Piedmont:

• Piedmont, Alabama
• Piedmont, California, near Oakland
• Piedmont, Missouri
• Piedmont, Oklahoma
• Piedmont, South Carolina
• Piedmont, West Virginia

• Piedmont Airlines was a regular passenger flight operator around the Piedmont section of the United States, to Florida and to the North-Eastern states.

• The Piedmont is also the name of a passenger train operated by Amtrak and the North Carolina Department of Transportation.

In recent centuries, the name Piedmont also refers to a region of the eastern United States of America. See: Piedmont (United States)

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