On the decoration of the Sala del Cambio, or old exchange, Perugino put forth the full force of his genius.
In the baths were found a number of works of art, now in the Vatican, notably the mosaic pavement of the Sala della Rotonda, and the celebrated head of Zeus and the head of Claudius in the same room.
Another hall, the Sala di Balia, has frescoes by Spinello Aretino (1408) with scenes from the life of Pope Alexander III., while yet another has been painted by local artists with episodes in recent Italian history.
Como suffered considerably from the early barbarian invasions, many of the inhabitants taking refuge on the Isola Comacina off Sala, but recovered in Lombard times.
This alphabet, which is probably the parent of the South-Indian character, is undoubtedly derived from the so-called Phoenician alphabet, the connecting link being the forms of the Sala inscriptions and of the Thamudaean inscriptions found by Doughty and Euting.
