warships. The following year some guns and artillery batteries were installed, but on 20 February 1916 Riva was hit again. The following day three Austrian planes bombed Desenzano, while on 27 February bombs fell in Nago and Torbole. In 1918 Riva was bombed again. Later Limone and, once again, Riva were targeted, but with the end of the war Trentino also passed into Italian hands. In the period between the two wars the poet Gabriele D'Annunzio settled in Gardone Riviera, where the "Vittoriale degli Italiani", his residence and now a museum, would later be built. Until 1943 the events of Second World War did not particularly affect the lake region, but following the birth of the Italian Social Republic the German command settled in Limone and, on 10 October, that of Benito Mussolini in Gargnano. The Ministry of Defense was located in Desenzano; the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Ministry of Popular Culture and the press agencies settled in Salò, which became the capital of the newborn German puppet republic. Fasano was the seat of the German embassy and Gardone of the Japanese one, while the Ministry of the Interior and the seat of the Republican Fascist Party (PFR) found accommodation in Maderno. The upper part of the lake was also occupied militarily by the Wehrmacht. In April 1945 the lake was freed by the Allies and later became part of the Republic of Italy. Myth and Legend According to the Greco-Roman mythology, the River Mincius was the child of the Lake Benacus. In ancient German Sagas, Garda was home to Ortnit. Towns and villages on the lake Around Lake Garda there are 26 comuni, the most populated being Desenzano del Garda (29,179 inhabitants), followed by Arco (17,857) and Riva del Garda (17,518). Economy Tourism Garda's economy is based on tourism. Back to Roman times, especially from the early imperial age, magnificent villas were present on the shores of the lake, conceived as places dedicated to otium, an activity actually reserved for the ruling classes. In particular Sirmione was a privileged place for the presence of sulphurous springs that allowed a thermal use. Starting from the Renaissance the lake returned to be populated with noble villas. Tourism in the modern conception of the term, however, developed from the end of the 19th century, even if it was still an élite tourism that concerned almost exclusively the north-western area of the