Continuing on from my previous two posts (read about those here), this post is the final installment of my weekend in Terni, Umbria, with the GAL Ternano association.
Our last day in Southern Umbria was to be concluded with a trip to Narni, a small town in the province of Terni. Name sound familiar? You’re probably thinking of The Chronicles of Narnia. Yet what you probably didn't know is that the imaginary land of Narnia, described in the works of C.S Lewis actually exists!
The ancient small hill town of Narni named ‘Narnia’ in Roman times, is rumoured to have inspired Lewis, fascinated by ancient history, after coming across the name in an atlas as a child.
It isn't difficult to see why the town of Narni, situated on a hill overlooking the black river, inspired the lion the witch and the wardrobe writer. There are many similarities to the fictional Narnia, such as medieval stone structures, charming cobblestone streets and a magical castle fortress steeped in rolling green hills.
While there are no talking animals or mythical beasts, real life Narni is full with palaces, churches, a fortress, roman bridges and some amazing underground tunnels.
On the way to Narni, there was a pitstop at ‘Il Ponte di Augusto’ ‘Augustus’ bridge’. Located at the entrance of the black river, the bridge was built in 27 BC and is an example of the golden age of the Roman empire. It was built to carry the Flaminian Way over the river Nera of the original four spans of the 160 metre long bridge, only the southernmost remains standing.
Il Ponte di Augusto’ ‘Augustus’ bridge
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The imposing bridge
The river Nera
The exploring of Narni began in the main square
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We were also shown around the town hall of Narni, by the mayor of Narni himself.
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Like many of the smaller towns of Umbria, Narni retains a strikingly medieval appearance, with stone buildings, and narrow cobblestone streets. It has become evident on my trip here that finding and discovering history is easy in this part of Italy, the town of Narni, especially... it was old even when the Ancient Romans discovered it in the 4th century BC. This rich and long history has resulted in an abundance of interesting sights, Narni certainly delivers with some mysterious and somewhat hauntingly interesting sites. One of these is the ‘Narni Sotterranea’ or the ‘underground Narni’. To be honest, living in Italy I've ashamedly become accustomed to fascinating history, however continuing on the theme of being surprised by the hidden gems of Terni, I surfaced from underground Narni, open mouthed, head spinning and thoroughly impressed.
Underground Narni is the Underground area discovered under the monastery complex of San Domenico, which only came to light in 1979. On first glance, the underground area could be a little underwhelming, however the history and the fascinating story behind the discovery of the area was ignited by our wonderful guide Annamaria in an 1.5 hour tour.
The underground secret tunnels of Narni were discovered by a group of young Italian Narni natives in 1979, (our guide was one of them, hence her extensive knowledge, talk about hearing it from the horses mouth!), this group of friends were all interested in speleology, that is exploring caves. This passion unsurprising given the aforementioned rich and extensive history as well as the enchanting nature of their native hometown. One day whilst exploring, they bumped into, or rather fell into a local old mans vegetable patch. Despite the man being grumpy about them messing around on his patch, after hearing about what they were doing, exploring and discovering caves, he suggested they check out a hole that led underground that no one had bothered to look in before. The curious group found what was a seemingly insignificant hole, covered in land, the group piled in, and what they discovered was a shock even to this inquisitive bunch... a chapel, with bright frescoes, albeit covered in debris.
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| photo - Narni Sotterranea |
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Frescoes dating back to the 13th through 15th centuries were discovered
After further exploration the discovered passageways and bricked up passages. Obviously overjoyed by their discovery, where no other human had set foot before, spirits where dampened as our guide told us that many people didn't believe their discovery.
The most fascinating part of the tale, was the fact that Annamaria had spent and dedicated most of her adult life to discovering what exactly it was that they found. She has relentlessly and for many years unfruitfully, researched the history of the underground caves. With little interest from others and little money, the group over a time span of more than 30 years slowly uncovered and discovered the secrets of underground Narni. Our guide, passionately told us about the immensity of the discovery, which was only discovered after travelling to many countries, relentlessly searching archives and then successfully finding the answer closer than you would think, just 50 kilometres away in the Vatican archives.
The information in the archives revealed that not only was there a 12th century chapel, ancient frescoes and the remains of monks, the secret passages lead to rooms which where were discovered to be Papal inquisition torture chambers. The archives revealed that the office of the Holy Inquisition had its headquarters here for over 200 years – a secret concealed for centuries.
A long corridor leads through a large room, once occupied by the "Room of torment" named in documents found in the Vatican Archives - photo - Narni Sotterranea
Proof of this is also the document of a trial held in Dublin in 1726, which described the daring escape of a Domenico Ciabocchi, a bigamist, who took advantage of a fatal distraction of a guard to get behind him and strangle him with a rope and escape.
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| photo - Narni Sotterranea |
Proof of this is also the document of a trial held in Dublin in 1726, which described the daring escape of a Domenico Ciabocchi, a bigamist, who took advantage of a fatal distraction of a guard to get behind him and strangle him with a rope and escape.
The guide left the best part until last, we were lead to one side of the great room where there was a small door that allowed access to a prison cell. A cell where the accused of the Inquisition were held. Standing in awe, in the tiny low ceiling cell of the condemned, who lacking paper or ink to tell their story, engraved their sufferings in the rock using white plaster and sharp shards. A combination of names, dates, symbols, has left a series of graffiti.
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| The prison cell - photo - Narni Sotterranea |
These inscriptions at first sight could seem like the doodlings of a bored confined prisoner however they were in fact a series of code and an invaluable insight into the life of the accused and into life at that point in time.
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Inscriptions left by the suffering prisoners
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Particularly interesting is the story of one prisoner Giuseppe Andrea Lombardini who spent 90 days here, in 1759. Fearing of seeing his messages of peace, freedom and justice deleted he translated them into a symbolic language, known by few, composed by masonic alchemy elements and cabalistic graffiti.
Despite the underground of Narni being interesting enough in itself, it was made particularly interesting by our guide Annamaria, the history was animated and brought to life through her zealous story telling. The passion and pride in her discovery was evident We were left on tender hooks at every twist and turn in the tale.
The tour ends up above ground the majestic church of Santa Maria Maggiore, today San Domenico, until the thirteenth century it was the cathedral of Narni.
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The church dates back to the 12th century
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I have no doubt that, although the underground caves are still off the beaten tourist track, the more interest shown, the more of Narni's secrets of the past will be discovered and I for one, can't wait to hear more.
It’s hard to believe all this exploring was packed into one morning. For lunch it was onto the Cantina La Palazzola in Stroncone, Terni, one of the most well known in the area.
The success is due in large part to the efforts of Riccardo Cotarella, who became their winemaker in the early 90's. In the past, La Palazzola sold their grapes to other wineries. But Cotarella, recognizing the vast potential of the area's fruit, soil and exposure, encouraged them to produce their own wine. Today they make their excellent wines from the fruit of their vineyards only.
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This was the second cantina we would visit in the region in the weekend, very different from the previous Cantine Zanchi, but just as interesting. We were greeted by owner Stefano Grilli, who gave us a tour of the vineyards that sprawl over 24 hectares. Stefano, obviously very knowledgable in the subject of wine, explained at length of the grape varieties they have, Pinot Noir, Cabernet, Merlot, Riesling and Sauvignon grapes, to name a few.
The production of red wines are the ‘bread and butter’ of the company, Stefano is however also dedicated to the development of quality sparkling wines as well as desert wines.
Eclectic and visionary Stefano is clearly a brilliant and wise winemaker and a lover of difficult challenges. He calls the current situation "work in progress", every year new flavours, new experiments, new wines and local grapes to be enhanced.
A detailed tour around the vast production area followed. What struck me was family feel to what otherwise is a large production site, walking to the bottling and labelling room, we passed the family kitchen, where Stefano's mamma was cooking up something. Walking down to the cellar, we passed some other rooms of the family home. Stefano and his family, living their lives , in amongst their work machinery. I cant say I wasn't a little envious, living in amongst all those amazing wines on tap... yes please!
The lunch that followed was nothing short of spectacular, a wine was paired with each course; an antipasto of a selection of pork meats, roasted pork, tasty local cheeses and a selection of Umbrian biscotti for desert.
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| An antipasto of local pork meats |
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| The wines with their respective bottles |
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| The secondo - you guessed it, pork. |
The wine pairings with each course, all of course produced on site at La Palazzola
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| Local cheeses |
Umbrian biscotti
Full of delicious food and wine, it was off to the train station to hop on the train back to Rome, very sure I would be returning soon.
That concludes my weekend in and around Terni, many thanks to Gal for letting me explore all the unexpected delights and secrets the area holds.
Links of all things mentioned
Associazione GAL Ternano - http://www.galternano.it
Nary sotterranea - http://www.narnisotterranea.it
Cantina La Palazzola - http://www.lapalazzola.it
Associazione GAL Ternano - http://www.galternano.it
Nary sotterranea - http://www.narnisotterranea.it
Cantina La Palazzola - http://www.lapalazzola.it
Ciao for now
Zoe
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