MONTEFALCO E FONTI DEL CLITUNNO

Montefalco, placed in a dominant position over the valleys of Topino and Clitunno, offers the viewer of a sweeping panorama of lands umbre.Gli most important buildings inside the ancient town walls which are certainly the municipal building of the XIII century as the church of Sant'Agostino, the Romanesque church of St. Bartholomew with the Portal of Frederick II of 1244 and the church of Santa Chiara in which we find paintings of the Umbrian school. No no circumstances should you forgetting to visit the fourteenth century church of San Francesco, which now houses the Museo Civico di Montefalco; In fact, inside, you'll find many paintings of great level like a Nativity by Perugino and the extraordinary cycle of frescoes: "The Stories of St. Francis by Benozzo Gozzoli. Near the inhabitated area you'll find the sixteenth century church of St. Illuminata and the fifteenth of San Fortunato which contains, in the lunette of the portal and in the altar of the right still works by Benozzo Gozzoli.Fra the most important typical products should absolutely mention the Sagrantino wine.

Have you ever seen the Clitunno sources? If not, and I guess not, otherwise I would have spoken, valley and see.

"I've seen recently and I regret having done too late."

So wrote Pliny the Younger to a friend and his advice is still valid oggi.Le Clitunno sources as we see them today are different from those of the First Century, in Pliny's time. A violent earthquake in 444 changed the face of the area and was probably the cause of the river Clitunno resizing, until then navigabile.La arrangement of the Clitunno as we see today is due to the work of Paul patient Campello della Spina that between 1860 and 1865 off the land to make room for the lake and provided to growing vegetation that still characterizes the Clitunno sources, a few years later Giosue Carducci wrote the ode barbaric at the Clitunno.Il passage Sources the poet is remembered today as a pillar by the Italian sculptor Leonardo Bistolfi with a script by Ugo Ojetti.Ma a few years before George Byron, on a pilgrimage to Italy, was spent on the banks of the Clitunno and you had left traces of his poetic vein. And always the time of Augustus imperial poet par excellence, Virgil, had brought about the park the curious legend of the oxen, immergendovisi, would become even more candidi.Una legend that has to do with the myth of the god Clitunno, deities that has its roots in pre-Roman religion and perhaps has native origins. What is certain is that it was celebrated in the imperial era, and there is evidence of the presence of Emperor Caligula that he attended "clitunnali" festivities in honor of the God that were held in primavera.Pi