Barga is a medieval town and comune of the province of Lucca in Tuscany, central Italy. It is home to around 10,000 people and is the chief town of the "Media Valle" (mid valley) of the Serchio.

Barga lies 35 km north of the provincial capital, Lucca. It is overlooked by the village of Albiano, a località of Barga, which in the 10th century was the site of a castle protecting the town.

Pania della Croce, a mountain of the Apuan Alps, dominates the surrounding chestnut trees, grape vines and olive groves.

Founded by the Lombards, the city grew as a castle surrounded by a line of walls, of which two gates (Porta Reale and Porta Macchiaia) have survived. The town was well known during the Middle Ages for the manufacture of silk threads which were exported to major centres such as Florence, its mills powered by the hydraulic power of the nearby creeks. In the Middle Ages, Lucca and Pisa battled frequently to conquer the wealthy town and the surrounding territory, and for a time Barga was part of the Florentine dominion, later Duchy and Grand Duchy of Tuscany. In 1847 it became part of the Duchy of Lucca, maintaining a certain degree of autonomy, until it became part of the Kingdom of Italy in 1861. Between 1331 and 1859 Albiano owed its allegiance to the Florentine State.^{[citation needed]} The region was part of the Gothic Line in World War II, and was the scene of fierce fighting between the Allies and Germans from October 1944 until April 1945.

Paolo Giovanni Nutini (born 9 January 1987) is a Scottish singer, songwriter and musician from Paisley.

Paolo Nutini's debut album, These Streets, was released by Atlantic Records in the United Kingdom in July 2006 and included the singles "Last Request", "Jenny Don't Be Hasty", "Rewind" and "New Shoes". "Last Request", the most successful, reached number five on the UK Singles Chart. The album peaked at number three on the UK Album Chart and was certified 4× platinum by the British Phonographic Industry (BPI). It has been in the album charts for a record-breaking 196 weeks.

In May 2009 Nutini released his second album, Sunny Side Up, which debuted at number one in the UK and has produced four singles; "Candy", "Coming Up Easy", "Pencil Full of Lead" and "10/10". It has so far been certified 4x platinum by the BPI. On 19 February 2010, it scooped "Best International Album" at the 2010 Meteor Awards.

Nutini's father is of Italian descent, from Barga, Tuscany, although both his parents are third-generation Scottish.

Giovanni Placido Agostino Pascoli (Italian pronunciation: [dʒoˈvanni ˈpaskoli]; December 31, 1855—April 6, 1912) was an Italian poet and classical scholar.

Giovanni Pascoli was born at San Mauro di Romagna (in his honor renamed "San Mauro Pascoli" in 1932), into a well-to-do family. He was the fourth of ten children of Ruggero Pascoli and Caterina Vincenzi Alloccatelli. His father was administrator of an estate of farm land of the Princes Torlonia on which the Pascoli family lived.

On the evening of Aug. 10, 1867 as Ruggero Pascoli was returning home from the market at Cesena in a carriage drawn by a black and white mare (una cavalla storna), he was shot and killed by an assassin hiding in a ditch by the road. The mare continued slowly on her way and brought home the body of her slain master. The murderer was never apprehended.

Giovanni Pascoli had a tragic childhood, struck by the murder of his father and the early deaths of his mother, sister and two brothers, and the subsequent financial decline of the family. The father's assassination echoes in particular in one of his most popular poems, "La cavallina storna" . His whole first work, Myricae (1891), reflects his unhappy childhood.