I went in the less tilty, taller tower and it was somewhat hair-raising going up all the rickety stairs in such a narrow, tall tube of bricks.

Man, in his hubris, tried to make cured meats that would reach the Heavens.

Between the 12th and the 13th century, Bologna was a city full of towers. Almost all the towers were tall (the highest being 97 metres (318.2 ft)), defensive stone towers. Besides the towers, there are still some fortified gateways (torresotti) that correspond to the gates of the 12th-century city wall (Mura dei torresotti or Cerchia dei Mille), which itself has been almost completely destroyed.

The reasons for the construction of so many towers are not clear. One hypothesis is that the richest families used them for offensive/defensive purposes during the period of the Investiture Controversy.

In the 13th century, many towers were taken down or demolished, and others simply collapsed.

Seems right about the time that the canon became a real thing capable of taking down walls doesn’t it? That would make towers a liability instead of an asset.