One of the best-preserved modern fortresses was part of a pivotal moment in the Italian Risorgimento.

Not far from the more famous House of Juliet, visitors will find the supposed residence of her lover.

Destroyed numerous times, this centuries-old bridge has always been rebuilt with its original design.

This Roman statue is missing a limb from when the Venetians stole it from Constantinople during the Crusades.

A whale rib was used to advertise the store by the arch that offered exotic goods from far away.

The bones of some 7,000 soldiers killed in the historic Battle of Solferino are stored here.

Two stone columns flank the grand Venice square, but there were supposed to be three.

Thousand-year-old Viking runes adorn an ancient Greek lion at the entrance to the Venetian Arsenal.

A magical and peaceful ruined Cistercian abbey in what is now southern Belgium.

The celebrated eyesore created by starry-eyed sweethearts.

The home where the famous astrologer wrote some of his most telling prophecies.

The Lone Star plaque hangs in a bombed-out bunker in Normandy to honor a Texan colonel's heroic actions on D-Day.

This facility has manufactured stunning tapestries for France's royalty ever since the 17th century.

An effigy of a trapped paratrooper dangles from a Normandy church to commemorate one remarkable D-Day event.

Guests can stay at a hotel in the former French abbey where lie the tombs of King Henry II and King Richard the Lionheart.

The approximate spot where the last Grand Master of the Knights Templar was put to death.

Remains of the artificial harbours invented for the Allied invasion of Normandy can still be seen at sea.

This enormous "cloth of the conquest" depicts the Norman invasion of England in mind-blowing detail.

A daring D-Day assault by U.S. Army Rangers is commemorated atop the high cliffs of this strategic point.

A memorial to the nearly 10,000 American soldiers laid to rest on the beaches of Normandy during WWII.

This bridge was constructed from the rubble of the infamous Bastille.

A 16th-century fountain marks the site of a lost medieval cemetery once filled with mass graves.

This former “ante-chamber to the guillotine” has been refurbished to illustrate the brutal history of French justice.

The curious underground history of keeping Paris clean.