Spello (Hispellum in Latin) is an Italian town of 8 466 inhabitants in the province of Perugia in Umbria. It is part of the circuit of the most beautiful villages in Italy and boasts the Orange Flag tourist-environmental quality mark, awarded by the Italian Touring Club.
Spello is a municipality that occupies the south-eastern sector
of the province of Perugia, in the Umbra Valley. The capital is
located at an altitude of 280 m above sea level.
The surface
of the municipality extends into the mountains, hills and plains.
The municipality rises, together with nearby Assisi, on the western
slopes of the Monte Subasio chain, in the Umbria-Marche Apennines.
It borders to the north with Assisi, to the north-east with
Valtopina, to the south and south-east with Foligno, to the
south-west with Bevagna and to the west with Cannara. It is
approximately 5 km from Foligno, 30 km from Perugia, 12 km from
Assisi and 35 km from Spoleto.
Spello was founded by the Umbrians to then be called
Hispellum in Roman times; she was later enrolled in the Lemonia
tribe. Later declared "Colonia Giulia" by Cesare and "Splendidissima
Colonia Julia" by Augusto, since it supported him in the war in
Perugia; after the victory of Augustus, he himself ceded a good part
of the territories ruled by Perusia to Hispellum and the dominion of
the city of Spello extended to the sources of Clitunno, which were
previously under the possession of Mevania. Later it was called
"Flavia Costante" by Costantino. Ancient Spello was considered one
of the most important cities in Roman Umbria.
The remains of
the walls, much wider in the past than we can admire today, attest
to the greatness that the city had, as well as the archaeological
remains that surround it. Devastating for Spello was the descent
into Italy of the Barbarians who reduced it from a populous city to
a poor hamlet. In the Lombard and Frankish ages it was part of the
Duchy of Spoleto, and then passed to the Papacy. However, the town,
mindful of the prosperity and relative autonomy it enjoyed in Roman
times, did not take long to become a free municipality with its own
laws. In 1516 the town was given by the pope to the Baglioni family
from Perugia to which it belonged until 1648.
In the 4th
century Spello was a bishopric and in the early Middle Ages, with
other neighboring dioceses and later suppressed, it was part of the
vast diocese of Spoleto for a long time. Since 1772 Spello has
instead been integrated into the diocese of Foligno.
Porta Consolare: main entrance
to the Roman city, in limestone from Subasio, with a medieval square
tower and three republican marble statues. The funerary statues were
added in the 16th century, coming from the area of the
amphitheater.
Augustan walls and Urbica gate: about 2 km, among
the most significant and intact city walls in Italy.
Porta Venere
and Towers of Properzio: Augustan, very harmonious, with two mighty
Romanesque dodecagonal towers.
Porta dell'Arce or dei Cappuccini:
Roman, northern entrance to the city.
Town Hall, in which there
are Roman inscriptions, two portraits of the Flavian age, a valuable
library with Venetian furniture and above all the well-known
rescript of Constantine dated 333-337 AD, sixteenth-century external
fountain with the emblem of Julius III. Palazzo Baglioni, in Piazza
della Repubblica, once the residence of the Baglioni of Perugia,
lords of Spello until 1648.
Palazzo Urbani, with a splendid
wooden gallery with canopy from the early 17th century.
Tega
Chapel, with frescoes by Alunno and the Mazzaforte workshop.
Collegiate Church of Santa Maria Maggiore, which houses, in the
Baglioni chapel, frescoes by Pinturicchio (about 1500-1501) and a
valuable floor of Deruta majolica ("Il frate", 1566). Precious and
rare is the Ciborium of the main altar, the work of Rocco da Vicenza
(1515). The original facade, from the 13th century, was completely
rebuilt around the middle of the 17th century. The interior has many
Baroque elements including an altar.
Church of Sant'Andrea
Apostolo, houses the Madonna enthroned and saints by Pinturicchio
and collaborators, from 1506-1508.
Church of San Lorenzo Martire,
with frescoes, a 15th century tabernacle and beautiful 17th century
paintings.
Church of San Claudio, near the town: beautiful 11th
century Romanesque church (perhaps built over a temple dedicated to
Saturn) with 14th century (Cola Petruccioli da Orvieto) and 15th
century (Unknown) frescoes inside.
Church of San Girolamo
Late
Roman (Augustan) villa, with remarkable well-preserved mosaics
inside a beautiful, recent modern structure, located in the
Sant'Anna area.
Villa Costanzi, much better known as Villa
Fidelia, of the seventeenth-eighteenth century, hosts events and
concerts every year.
Civic and diocesan art gallery, located in
the Palazzo dei Canonici, has an interesting collection of works
ranging from the fourteenth to the twentieth century.