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Umbria

Guide to Tuscany

Panorama di Orvieto

Once the home of St. Francis. Umbria is not only blessed with a gentle landscape of lakes and rivers but also marked by once-powerful cities that still command respect from their high volcanic cliffs. Not far from haughty Perugia and ancient Orvieto, both strongholds and refuge to 16th C. Pope Clement, lies the lovely hill town of Todi. The surrounding green valleys and pastures of today seem in contrast with the towns’ stark stone external structures whose sole purpose was defence. Show me properties in Umbria

Perugia

Perugia looks over the Lake Trasimeno and is a University city with a medieval heart. Park close to the station and take the unusual outdoor escalator that leads into town: the mobile staircase takes you into an underground medieval town, part of the city that was buried when the Pope Paul III built the Rocca Paolina over the old palaces of the Baglioni family, after stepping in to quell the continuous fighting within the city. The Rocca is no longer there, but the buried towers still are and you can experience the strange feeling of walking through a medieval city that has a vaulted brick sky.

Northern Umbria

Going North from Perugia you will find Gubbio and Città di Castello. The first one is the most medieval of the Umbrian towns and is charming to visit – try and go for the Corsa dei Ceri on May 15th. The Candles (Ceri) consist of three huge wooden constructions, octagonal in shape, fixed to a hand-barrow and up to 7 metres in height, each summoned by the statue of a Saint: St. Ubaldo, protector of Masons; St. Giorgio, protector of merchants; St. Antonio, protector of farm workers. Città di Castello has a charming centre. Worth seeing there is the Pinacoteca Comunale which has works by Signorelli and Raffaello and the collection of the works of Alberto Burri a main exponent of the “arte povera” in the Seccatoi del Tabacco – large buildings previously used to dry tobacco, worth seeing for their own sake.

Orvieto and Todi

This Southern area of Umbria has steeper hills and a more surprising aspect – Orvieto, like many other local towns, is built on a steep-sided tufa outcrop, giving it an impregnable look. Its Duomo is one of the greatest gothic buildings in Italy and steers a close course between genius and gaudiness. The strange Pozzo di san Patrizio is also worthy of a visit. It was designed by Antonio da Sangallo il Giovane, commissioned by Pope Clement VII when he expected to have to flee Rome for Orvieto and wanted to ensure the town’s water supply. Antonio cut down through the Tufa, to the rock below finding an Etruscan tomb on his way and finally reached the water 62 metres down. The well is 10 metres wide with an ingenious double helix staircase, allowing donkeys carrying water to travel along the staircase without ever crossing paths.

Todi is a beautiful town with Etruscan origins. Some of the most beautiful finds from Etruscan tombs have been discovered around the town. Now, it is a pleasant town with what has been described as the most perfect medieval piazza in Italy. Worth visiting is the Museo-Pinacoteca di Todi even just for the building itself and the church of Santa Maria della Consolazione thought to be the work of Cola di Caprarola possibly inspired by Bramante.

Between the last week of June and the middle of July Spoleto holds the Festival de due Mondi a fantastic festival of music, prose, theatre, performing arts and cinema.

For more information visit the following website: Spoleto Festival