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The convent of Saint Bernardino and the bernardinian tradition
An outline of Montefranco History
The history of Montefranco

Montefranco views from its 414 meters of altitude the Nera Valley, between olive trees, pinete and forests of oaks.
The first takeovers in the territory are made to go back to the V - IV sec. a.C., because on the Moro mount, that dominates the town, recent archaeological researches have brought to light parts of two floor layered places of a republican roman age building, but remained in use until to advancing imperial age. There are significant traces of a more ancient Umbrian place of cult, whose presence is marked from the discovery of small votive bronze statues of the V - IV sec. a.C., and of two adjacent circular cisterns, both dug in the limestone but finished with various techniques; in these cisterns, beyond to the bronzetti, have been founded votive material in terracotta with anatomical forms, architectonic elements relevant to the republican sanctuary and terracottas.

The ancient village, that once was encircled of walls and from various towers, is again lively and coloured by the presence of evocative landscapes. The primitive nucleus is the Castle of Bufone, risen probably at the end of the first millennium. Naturally fortified, represented a defense from the Saracen horde that infested the valley during their passages in the 10th century. This castle was guided for a period from a nephew of Ottone IV in 1209, being itself rebelled to Pope Innocenzo III. In 1228 it was granted from Spoleto to some men of Arrone, escaped from the dominion of Rinaldo, that roved in Val di Narca on behalf of Federico II. The escape of these men caused disputes for the possession of the assets that they leaved; so the new country was for the escaped like a free zone, being itself rendered free from Arrone. From here the name of Montefranco, which sounds like “mountfree”.
The new castle was always possession of the Common of Spoleto and in 1258 it renewed the submission and it had in exchange much favours; the exemption from the payment of the taxes of entrance of the goodses made to call free Door that from where the goodies exited and Spoletina Door that one in which the traders from Spoleto re-entered. Such exoneration from the takes will be enjoyed from Montefranco until the arrival of the Roman Republic in 1849.
In the 1264 Montefranco has been occupied from Germanic troops and Muslems of the Ghibelline Percivalle Doria, immediately rejected from Spoleto’s troops.
After Ghibellinism, Montefranco joined the confederation of the twelve castles that, guided by the S. Peter in Valley Abbey, did not renew the submission to Spoleto. In 1338, after a long cause, the castles were acquitted.
In the 1372 these rebellious castles were newly obligated to submission to Spoleto and in the 1395 the Abbey of S. Peter in Valley occupied Montefranco. The army of Terni, already defeats in other occasions, asked aid to Antonio Savelli from Amelia, valiant warrior, that, enlist also some people from Terni, moved in 1498 with its troops towards Montefranco. The Spoleto’s troops arrived and, although without a chief, they succeeded to reject from that castle the attacking ones.
They were not more than three hundred against one thousand soldiers of the Savelli: the small army collected on the Mount Moor and defense it, fighting with great courage. The dead men were many from both the parts. The evening the two exercises withdrawed; Spoleto troops in Saint Mamiliano and terni troops with Savelli towards Cerni, burning everything until Strettua.
In the 1522 Montefranco participated to the new rebellion of the Castles of the Valnerina against Spoleto: in the 1527 some troops of Sciarra Colonna destroyed the town and later on Pope Paolo V took it off from Spoleto.
Urbano VIII re-united it to Spoleto in 1627: the same Pope in 1639 made to open the road from the Flaminia to Montefranco-Valnerina-Scheggino-Gavelli-Monteleone, called of the Ferriere, remembered in locality Arma of Pope Urbano from a statue. In 1798 it was joined to the Cantone of Terni with Arrone, Castel di Lago and Collestatte. To difference of the other countries in the napoleonico period it received with unusual patriotism the French soldiers, but this astuteness did not save the country from the order to decrease from the towers the bells for being destroyed and from one penal of 700 shield.
With the return of the government of the Popes in the 1816 Montefranco became house of the Governement of Valnerina, that it lasted alone two years for the protests of the rival Arrone. The National Unity assigned definitively this town to the department of Terni, where inhabitants went to work in the industries, altering therefore the consolidated appearance of the town, oil producer and trader.
Only two were the tryes to implant industries here, a breeding of beavers and a factory of matches, but but the most important innovation has been the inauguration of electrical power in 1909.