Mentioned, with the name Salso, in a document of the second half of the ninth century, it has linked its economic and urban development to the exploitation of the local sources of salt waters.
These, known and used for the extraction of sodium chloride since Roman times, have a high therapeutic value, discovered only in the first half of the nineteenth century by Doctor Lorenzo Berzieri. The name, Salsomaggiore until 1956, comes from the adjective "salso" (Latin SALSUS).
In the Middle Ages, it belonged to the powerful Pallavicino family, who, in addition to upgrading the existing salt factories, had others built. Following the fate of the surrounding territories, over the centuries it has been subjected to several rulers, including the Visconti, the Sforza, the Farnese and the Bourbons.
The historical and architectural heritage includes: the former Grand-Hotel des Thermes, with sumptuous halls with an oriental aspect; the L. Berzieri Spa, from the first half of the twentieth century, with the facade covered with marble and ceramics; the contemporary church of Sant'Antonio; the parish church of S. Vitale, built in the twenties of the twentieth century; the oratory of S. Bartolomeo; the railway station, with the interior decorated with frescoed windows, allegorically depicting the most important phases of the history of Salso ; the parish church of S. Salvatore, in Salsomaggiore-Vasi ; the fifteenth-century castle and church of Santa Maria Assunta, of the eighteenth century, in the locality of Bargone; the castle, of 1100, and the sixteenth-century parish of Tabiano; the ancient parish church of S. Giovanni, in Contignaco; the castle and the eighteenth-century church of S. Silvestro, in Scipione; the church of S. Nicomede, of the ninth century, in the same locality.
The birth of the Terme di Salsomaggiore and Tabiano dates back to 1839, the year in which the first therapeutic experiments with salsobromoiodic waters were carried out in Salsomaggiore, waters already known and used in ancient times by the Celts and the Romans to extract a very important item : the kitchen salt.