Montalto Dora (Montàut in Piedmontese) is an Italian town of 3,401 inhabitants in the metropolitan city of Turin, in Piedmont. In Roman times a Roman consular road built by Augustus passed the Via delle Gallie to connect the Po Valley with Gaul.
The castle
The castle of
Montalto Dora, which stands at an altitude of 405 meters on Mount
Crovero in Montalto Dora, dates back to the mid-twelfth century;
over the centuries it has undergone numerous destructions,
rebuildings and renovations, until it assumed, in 1890, with the
restoration designed by Alfredo d'Andrade, the appearance it has
roughly preserved until today.
Today privately owned, the castle
is an integral part of the Roman village on which it stands and has
an irregular square plan with a double wall. A high tower dominates
the internal part around the keep, the annexed chapel, the rooms
that can be partially visited and the guard walkway. In ancient
times it functioned as a fortress to guard the Ivrea lake plain and
the road leading to Valle d'Aosta.
The castle was used by the
director Dario Argento for the shooting of the Dracula 3D movie.
The parish church of Sant'Eusebio
From the year 1242 Montalto
was a parish under this title. In 1812 the parish church of
Sant'Eusebio was restructured and embellished during the
construction of the Napoleonic road to Aosta. Inside the church
there are paintings by Visetti di Montanaro and the tomb of the
Vallesa.
The Casana villa
The villa was built by Baron
Valesa who had received as a gift in 1589, from Duke Vittorio Amedeo
I, the fiefdom of Montalto Dora as a reward for his services as
governor during the siege of Turin. The palace was initially a very
modest residence castle with little garden. Around 1818, Count
Alessandro, major general of the armed Regie and minister of state,
with the help of the architect Giuseppe Maria Talucchi, transformed
that residence into a large and grandiose palace.
The church
of San Rocco
Built between the end of the fifteenth and the
beginning of the sixteenth century, the church finds its own
historical and artistic interest by virtue of the cycle of frescoes
that almost entirely covers the internal walls
The Pistono
and Nero lakes
In the municipal area there are two small lakes
created in the Pleistocene by the ancient glacier that ran through
the Dora valley, the Nero lake (299 m aboce sea level, north of the
town) and the Pistono lake (280 m a.s.l., east).
The airfield
In the municipal area, parallel to the river, there is an airfield
surveyed and reported in the international aeronautical cartography.
Due to its position it is an important aeronautical point of
interest for those who enter or leave the Aosta Valley in flight.
The track has a grass surface, a length of 620 meters and a width of
30 meters, with an orientation of 14-32.
By plane
The city is 54 km from Cuneo International Airport, which
is connected to the city by aerobus; domestic and international flights
depart from this airport.
Domestic flights: Alghero, Cagliari,
Trapani.
International flights: Bacău, Bucharest-Otopeni, Casablanca,
Međugorje (Mostar), Palma de Mallorca, Rhodes, Tirana.
By car
The city of Neive can be reached via the A33 Cuneo-Asti motorway and the
A6 Turin-Savona motorway.
On the train
The closest station is
Alba, from where there are bus connections to Neive. The Neive station,
located on the Alba - Castagnole line, has not been in service since
2014.
By bus
Neive is connected with other localities through
the Bus Company.
There are four types of wine that are produced on the Neivesi hills: Barbera and Dolcetto d'Alba, Barbaresco and Moscato d'Asti.
The municipality of Neive occupies an area of 21.3 km² in the
north-eastern sector of the province of Cuneo, on the border with the
province of Asti, and is immersed in the wine-growing landscape of the
Langhe. The capital Neive rises at 308 m a.s.l.
It is 10 km from
Alba (the main town of reference), about 79 km from Cuneo and 27 km from
Asti.
It seems to owe its name to the gens Naevia, a noble Roman family of
which it was a possession: around 100 BC. it was already a significant
Roman settlement, crossed by the via Aemilia Scauri, so called from the
name of its builder, the consul Emilio di Scauro.
In the Middle
Ages a fortified castle was erected there (destroyed in 1274) and in
Borgonuovo the monastery of Santa Maria del Piano was built in the 10th
century by Benedictine monks, it depended on the abbey of Santa Croce in
Mortara; of the ancient monastic building which fell into ruin starting
from the 17th century, today only the Romanesque bell tower and the
adjacent sacristy, transformed into a chapel, remain.
The Neivese
feud, between the 11th and 13th centuries, was divided between some
local lords, in particular the De Revellos. Long disputed, in the
communal age, between Asti and Alba; in 1242, however, it was Asti that
secured its definitive possession and permanently included it in its
territorial structure, of which it followed all the historical events
and passages to the various lordships. At the end of the 14th century,
Luigi di Valois, duke of Orléans and lord of Asti included Neive in the
Captaincy of Astesana, an administrative division of strategically
important municipalities placed to defend the County of Aste. On this
occasion the village was completely surrounded by good and solid walls.
At the beginning of the 16th century, in the context of the conflicts
between Francis I and Charles V, it alternately passed under the
dominion of France and Spain.
In 1531 Neive, together with the
whole County of Asti was annexed by Charles III to the Duchy of Savoy.
After a new parenthesis of French domination, in 1560 it returned
permanently to the Savoy with Duke Emanuele Filiberto. Only towards the
middle of the 17th century, following a general reform of the provinces
of the Duchy, Neive was separated from that of Asti and assigned to that
of Alba which had just been established. Following the Napoleonic
campaign in Italy and the establishment of the Cisalpine Republic, in
1800 it obtained the recognition of "Municipality". He returned to the
Savoy in 1814 and followed the historical events of the family until the
establishment of the Italian Republic.
The coat of arms was recognized by decree of the head of government
of July 14, 1936. It can be blazoned:
«Red, to the trofogliate
cross, set aside by four similar crosses, all of silver. Commune
exterior ornaments.
The gonfalon is a white cloth.
The roads leading to Neive cross the typical landscape of the Langhe,
made up of white hills planted with vines: we are in an area where great
wines are produced. Neive is in fact also a destination for visits to
its wineries, often housed in stately homes, such as the
eighteenth-century Palazzo dei Conti of Castelborgo.
There are
four types of wines that are produced on the Neivesi hills:
Barbera
d'Alba;
Dolcetto d'Alba;
Barbaresco;
Moscato d'Asti.
It has been included in the club of the most beautiful villages in
Italy, it also boasts the orange flag of tourist-environmental quality
awarded by the Italian Touring Club.
Infrastructure and transport
The municipality can be easily reached thanks to the Castagnito
tollbooth on the A33 motorway, only a few kilometers away.
La società di calcio Ivrea Montalto milita nel campionato di Terza
Categoria. Il campo ha sede presso la zona delle regioni Ghiare e ha una
capienza di 2100 posti. La società vanta un discreto settore giovanile a
level regional.
La squadra di basket cittadina, Pallacanestro
Montalto Dora, gioca nel campionato di Serie D.
La squadra di
volley femminile, A.S.D. Pallavolo Montalto Dora, Milita nel Campionato
di Serie C.